SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 10, 2026--
Pictory, the AI-powered video creation platform used by creators and businesses worldwide, today released its 2026 State of the AI Video-Creation Industry Report. Based on aggregated and anonymized data from more than 1.5 million videos created on the Pictory platform during 2026, the report provides one of the industry’s most comprehensive looks at how organizations, creators, educators, and marketers are using AI to produce video content.
This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20260610439066/en/
The findings show that AI video creation has moved beyond experimentation and into everyday professional use. Content teams increasingly rely on AI-powered workflows to transform existing assets into videos, while AI-native formats such as avatars, generated imagery, and automated voiceovers continue to gain momentum.
“The data shows that AI video creation is no longer a niche activity,” said Vikram Chalana, Co-Founder and CEO of Pictory. “We’re seeing professionals across industries adopt AI-powered workflows to create content faster, repurpose existing assets, and scale video production in ways that were previously impossible.”
Among the report’s most notable findings:
These differences underscore how AI video adapts to specific business objectives, from engagement and education to lead-generation and internal communications.
According to the report, businesses that effectively repurpose existing content, integrate AI-generated visuals, and adopt scalable video workflows are competing in an increasingly visual marketplace.
The full 2026 State of the AI Video-Creation Industry Report is available at https://pictory.ai/free-tools/2026-state-of-video-report.
About Pictory
Pictory is an AI-powered video creation platform that enables businesses, marketers, educators, and creators to transform text, URLs, documents, and audio into professional-quality videos.
Pictory's 2026 State of AI Video-Creation Industry Report. PowerPoint to Video is a scenario dominated by Educators and Enterprise creators. There are 11 more takeaways based on 1.5 million videos created in the first half of 2026. From when most creators create, to which countries create the longest videos, and what US State uses the most Avatars, per capita.
The Justice Department has moved to dismiss its criminal case against a labor union leader who was arrested while protesting the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in California.
The U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles filed a motion Monday to dismiss its case against David Huerta, president of Service Employees International Union California, which has more than 750,000 members including janitors, security officers and other workers. The government will seek to have the case permanently withdrawn within weeks if Huerta continues to comply with the terms of his pretrial release and stays out of trouble, prosecutors said.
Huerta said in a statement that he was tackled, pepper-sprayed and detained for exercising his constitutional rights to protest and cast the case against him as part of a broader “weaponization of the judicial system.”
“There was never a real case, only an attempt to punish and silence me for exercising my constitutional rights,” he said in a statement. “I will keep exercising my constitutional rights and protest every abuse this administration commits, and I will keep working to build a country that treats immigrant families and all workers with the dignity they deserve.”
The Justice Department had earlier reduced the felony obstruction charge to a misdemeanor, and in moving to dismiss it entirely, is now backing away entirely from a prosecution that had been announced with fanfare on social media after Huerta's arrest more than a year ago. It's the latest courtroom setback for a department that has struggled, in offices across the country, in its prosecutions of people accused of assaulting or hindering federal officers while protesting President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
The U.S. attorney's office in Los Angeles signaled in its own statement that law enforcement was justified in arresting Huerta, noting that he was charged with interfering with a judicial search warrant and asserting that the Justice Department does not arrest people for simply peacefully protesting. The office also said that Huerta has complied with the terms of his bond for more than a year and was prepared to dismiss the case if he continues to do so.
“Pursuant to an agreement entered into with our office, if Mr. Huerta continues to comply with his pretrial release terms, we expect the criminal case against him to be fully dismissed by the end of next month,” the statement said.
Huerta was arrested in June 2025 while protesting outside a business in Los Angeles where federal agents were investigating suspected immigration violations. The incident occurred amid widespread protests over the federal immigration crackdown that drove Trump to take the extraordinary move of deploying the National Guard to the nation’s second-largest city.
Authorities said Huerta sat down in front of a vehicular gate and encouraged others to walk in circles to try to prevent law enforcement from going in or out, and he pushed back when an officer told him to leave and put his hands on Huerta to move him out of the way of a vehicle.
According to a copy of a letter laying out the terms of Huerta’s diversion agreement, Huerta and the government agreed to a stipulated set of facts, including that he arrived at the search warrant location, positioned himself in the driveway outside the front gate “to oppose the policies and tactics of the enforcement activity he observed and encouraged others to do the same” and that, as a result, “at least one federal agent” who participated in the search warrant “credibly believed he was unable to enter the front gate.”
Union leaders and immigrant advocates rallied in cities across the country demanding Huerta's release, and he became the face of the pushback against the Republican president's effort to drive up immigration arrests. Top Democrats also fired back. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer and California’s two Democratic senators wrote a letter to federal officials demanding answers regarding Huerta’s arrest. California Sen. Adam Schiff attended Huerta’s bond hearing.
“It is deeply troubling that a U.S. citizen, union leader, and upstanding member of the Los Angeles community continues to be detained by the federal government for exercising his rights to observe immigration enforcement,” the senators wrote.
Federal prosecutors initially charged Huerta with felony obstruction, with Bill Essayli, the top federal prosecutor in Los Angeles, saying that it didn't matter who was protesting "if you impede federal agents, you will be arrested and prosecuted.” In October, prosecutors reduced the charge against Huerta to a misdemeanor.
Huerta’s lawyers, Abbe Lowell and Marilyn Bednarski, said in a statement that the case against their client had no legal basis.
“This case, like others, sought to silence criticism of the administration’s improper immigration actions. Today’s filing is proof that David and other critics will not be silenced,” the lawyers said.
FILE - David Huerta, the president of the Service Employees International Union California who was arrested during an immigration raid, speaks after he was released on a bond in downtown Los Angeles on June 9, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes, File)
