Good morning. It’s Tuesday, June 23.
- Drivers accuse gas stations of algorithmic price fixing.
- Democratic socialists show momentum in Los Angeles.
- And a look back at 1945 beach fashion in LIFE magazine.
Please note: There will be no newsletter tomorrow. Back in your inbox on Thursday.
Statewide
1.
A group of California drivers sued gas station operators on Monday, accusing them of using artificial intelligence to illegally manipulate prices. The lawsuit, which names Walmart, 7-Eleven, BP, and others, said the scheme violated a state law barring algorithmic price fixing that took effect on Jan. 1. In areas where gas stations used an AI tool to analyze data from competitors, prices were inflated by as much as 30 cents, according to the complaint. “While families struggle to afford the commute to work, defendants have conspired to put an end to competition,” it said. Bloomberg | Reuters
2.
When Sable Offshore, a small oil company seeking to resume drilling off Santa Barbara, ran into local obstacles, it turned to the Trump administration. Politico reports:
“First, the company asked federal regulators to take oversight of its pipeline from the state, which they agreed to do. To get around the state barriers that remained, Sable’s lawyers asked the Department of Energy to invoke its national defense powers to order a restart. With the help of an executive order from Trump, [Energy Secretary Chris] Wright did so in March. Sable promptly got its oil flowing and made its first sales by the end of that month.”
3.
Over two decades, Mollie Engelhart and her family built a vegan restaurant empire across California called Cafe Gratitude. Then they abandoned veganism, fled California to become cattle ranchers in Texas, and embraced MAHA ideals. Reporter Lydia Horne visited Engelhart at her ranch:
“She has no time for filters, as she launches into conspiracy theories (‘water has memory’) and descriptions of her bowel movements. ‘I’m a freedom-of-speech maximalist,’ she tells me. She also tells me it’s time I start having children — ‘as soon as possible.'” Alta magazine
4.
George Rose, a veteran photojournalist who specializes in California’s beauty, once told a reporter that landscape photography requires “an incredible obsession with patience.” At moments along the sun’s arc, he continued, “there’s drama in the colors. And I obsess a little bit about that, because you have to go find it.” On Monday, the Atlantic published a photo gallery of California seen through Rose’s lens.
Northern California
5.
When a group of French nuns opened a new soup kitchen in San Francisco’s Mission District in March, they were eager to start helping people in a part of the city long wracked by poverty. But they have faced resistance from an unexpected source: the building’s homeowners association. Most recently, the HOA ordered the nuns to remove their sign, saying it had not gone through the proper approval process. “We really feel like it’s religious persecution,” said Sister Mary Valerie. “We are helping poor people in San Francisco. We bring comfort to them.” S.F. Chronicle
6.
“Fish, it turned out, just needed water.”
For decades, dams and diversions strangled Northern California’s Putah Creek, robbing it of salmon. Then a legal settlement in 2000 forced water managers to release flows along the creek that roughly mimicked nature. Volunteers helped with riparian plantings and cleanups. By 2013, a handful of salmon had returned, followed by more. In 2025, there were more than 2,000. “It’s the Field of Dreams thing: ‘If you build it, they will come,’” said Andrew Rypel, a fish ecologist. “With science, with community, you can do some really special things.” High Country News
7.
Chief executives of public companies are typically discouraged from taking large stakes in outside ventures, lest they present conflicts of interest. Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, has more than 80 active startup investments, an analysis found. Many are closely tied to the artificial intelligence boom, and at least 10 have or have recently discussed deals with OpenAI. The Wall Street Journal charted Altman’s many business entanglements as OpenAI prepares to go public.
- In a new interview, Microsoft’s Satya Nadella delivered a blistering critique of the AI boom, saying power had become too concentrated. Companies, he said, need to “do the hard work in earning the social permission.”
Southern California
8.
A federal judge on Monday rejected a Trump administration lawsuit that sought to block Los Angeles’ sanctuary ordinance, which prohibits the use of city resources for immigration enforcement. The administration argued that L.A. was trying to regulate the federal government. The ordinance does no such thing, U.S. District Judge Fernando Olguin ruled. “Rather, it ‘controls the actions of [the City’s] own agents and agencies.'” President Trump’s efforts to punish sanctuary jurisdictions have repeatedly failed in court across both of his presidencies. L.A. Times | Courthouse News
9.
Democratic socialists are increasingly ascendant in Los Angeles. Nithya Raman, a mayoral hopeful, and Marissa Roy, a candidate for city attorney, are both members of the Democratic Socialists of America. Should they prevail, it would underscore the leftward tilt of the city, which already has four City Council members affiliated with the DSA. The Los Angeles Times reports: “The DSA champions ideas sharply to the left of more establishment Democrats … The L.A. DSA chapter, for example, says its objectives include abolishing prisons and defunding the police.”
10.
Wimbledon stunned the tennis world on Sunday by announcing that Serena Williams, pride of Compton, would play singles as a wild card entry. The news has fans debating how far Williams can go at age 44 after nearly four years away from professional tennis. It also got people talking about GLP-1s. Williams, a paid spokesperson for a telehealth company, has said in ads that she lost 34 pounds with the help of the drug tirzepatide. The Atlantic explored the question, “Are GLP-1s performance-enhancing drugs?”
11.
“The revolution has made it quite permissible for even the most proper women to appear on public beaches in costumes which used to be seen only in the rowdiest cabarets.”
In 1945, the LIFE photographer Walter Sanders journeyed out west to document the latest swimwear fashions, which had seen a radical transformation since the bathing gowns that predominated only a couple generations prior. His pictures in Laguna Beach, LIFE declared, captured a level of exhibitionism that would surely never be surpassed. Google Arts & Culture shared dozens of unpublished images from Sanders’ photoshoot.
12.
If monogamy were a contest, humans would beat meerkats but lose resoundingly to the California deermouse. The big-eared critters, abundant in woodlands across the southern half of the state, are flawlessly faithful. How they manage relationships could hold lessons for fellow mammals. Scientists once conducted an experiment that separated male deermice from their partners and placed them with other females. When the couples reunited, they fought. But notably, those that made peace quickest were the most likely to raise healthy offspring. The males in the more resilient pairs were also quicker to tend to their pups. “They were better dads,” said biologist Josh Pultorak, who led the study. The parallels to human behavior were striking, he said: “Like it or not, we have a very similar basic system, hormonally and brain-wise.”
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