NiemanLab: “A new policy at Law360, the legal news service owned by LexisNexis, requires that every story pass through an AI-powered “bias” detection tool before publication. The Law360 Union, which represents over 200 editorial staffers across the 350-person newsroom, has denounced the mandate since it went into effect in mid-May. On June 17, unit chair Hailey Konnath sent a petition to management calling for the tool to be made “completely voluntary.” “As journalists, we should be trusted to select our own tools of the trade to do our information-gathering, reporting and editing — not pressured to use unproven technology against our will,” reads the petition, which was signed by over 90% of the union. Law360 currently reaches over 2.8 million daily newsletter subscribers with breaking legal news and analysis. At the end of last year, the newsroom began experimenting with a suite of AI tools built in-house by LexisNexis to streamline story production. One of those tools analyzes the overall “bias” of article drafts and picks out lines of copy that should be edited to sound more “impartial.” Use of the tool, later known as the “bias indicator,” was voluntary until May 15. That’s when editor-in-chief Anne Urda notified the Law360 Union in an email that moving forward the use of AI tools was mandatory for all stories, particularly use cases like “applying a neutral voice to copy.” She also named several other mandatory use cases like headline drafting, story tagging, and “article refinement and editing.” In an email sent to editorial staff the following day, Urda said leadership was “exploring how to increase usage” of its AI tools through the mandate, but otherwise provided no explanation for the policy change. The announcement came a few weeks after an executive at Law360’s parent company accused the newsroom of liberal political bias in its coverage of the Trump administration. At an April town hall meeting, Teresa Harmon, vice president of legal news at LexisNexis, cited unspecified reader complaints as evidence of editorial bias. She also criticized the headline of a March 28 story — “DOGE officials arrive at SEC with unclear agenda” — as an example. In the same town hall, Harmon suggested that the still experimental bias indicator might be an effective solution to this problem, according to two employees in attendance. It’s unclear if Harmon had any direct role in implementing the subsequent AI mandate. Urda told multiple editorial staffers that the decision came from “above her.”…”