“Members of Congress and governors are under increasing pressure to regulate AI, but more than two dozen of them who spoke with Axios said they don’t use the technology or have rarely done so,” Axios reports.
“Why it matters: That striking admission — particularly among older, influential lawmakers — comes amid calls for an AI slowdown and warnings within the industry that it could end humanity if left unchecked.”
Nate Cohn: “The A.I. issue is moving fast. Just a few months ago, it barely registered on the political scale. Now A.I. data centers and, more recently, A.I. safety are taking center stage in campaigns and in Washington, with members of both parties debating whether and how the technology should be regulated.”
“But as important as artificial intelligence may soon become, the latest New York Times/Siena poll suggests that A.I. is not poised to be one of the most important issues in this year’s midterm elections. For now, it might best be compared to the many issues that earn the passionate support of small interest groups — like, say, climate change — but that don’t do much to shape national electoral outcomes.”
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“In thundering, back-to-back speeches, Senator Bernie Sanders and Stephen K. Bannon on Tuesday denounced the billionaires who run the country’s largest tech companies and urged Americans to demand tighter restrictions on artificial intelligence before its capabilities exceed human control,” the New York Times reports.
“The unusual public appearances by the country’s elder democratic socialist and a leading architect of the MAGA movement, at a conference in Washington, underscored the deep and rising anxiety over the potential destructive power of artificial intelligence.”
Bloomberg: AI fears give Bernie Sanders a rare moment of unity with Bannon.
“To watch AI CEOs saying, ‘We’re about to destroy the world so give us control of the government so we can lock in our monopoly status and prevent any innovators from challenging us,’ is just lunacy. And, by the way, if you’re about to destroy the world, how about, don’t. How about, stop.”
— Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), quoted by Politico.
“Sen. Bernie Sanders decried Washington on Tuesday for failing to regulate artificial intelligence, including the advanced models that AI researchers, tech executives and safety advocates warn pose an existential risk to humanity,” Politico reports.
Said Sanders: “Congress under both Democratic and Republican control has been asleep at the wheel. And we now have a president whose ignorance regarding this issue is truly embarrassing.”
CBS News: Sanders says potential danger of AI is “probably greater” than nuclear weapons.
“Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-GA) on Monday said President Trump will likely not heed calls from technology leaders to implement guardrails on the development of artificial intelligence because of his family’s investments in the industry,” NewsNation reports.
Said Ossoff: “They’ve invested heavily in AI labs. They’ve invested heavily in data centers. So, the first family has a financial stake in this industry, and as a result, the president of the United States is compromised.”
“Senate Republicans on Tuesday signaled opposition to a Democratic counteroffer on a major cryptocurrency bill, raising the possibility that the legislation could fail on a key floor vote later Tuesday,” Politico reports.
Paul Krugman: “Will AI transform the economy? The jury is still out on that one: So far there is little evidence for either the massive job losses or the soaring productivity growth industry leaders threatened/promised, but it’s still early days.”
“But AI does seem to be transforming U.S. politics. I can’t think of a technology that has inspired so much hate across such a wide political spectrum. Even the leading AI companies are warning about the dangers of their technology and pleading for government regulation to slow it down.”
“Which makes it more than puzzling that Donald Trump is going all in on AI, claiming that concerns about its dangers are a ‘hoax’ and opposing any kind of regulation.”
“In so doing, he’s taking a wildly unpopular position.”
“After decades of battling VPNs and other workarounds, Tehran has built a system that keeps most citizens on a controlled national network while giving elites privileged access to the global internet,” Bloomberg reports.
“The U.S. Senate is set to vote on Tuesday on whether to advance once-in-a-generation cryptocurrency legislation, potentially determining the fate of the bill as Republican Senate leaders grapple with a limited calendar in a busy election year,” Reuters reports.
“The bill, dubbed the Clarity Act, would create a regulatory framework for digital assets, which crypto companies say would put them on more solid legal footing. The deep-pocketed industry has spent hundreds of millions of dollars campaigning to advance the bill.”
NPR: This bill could reshape crypto in America — and it’s sparking a major battle.
“President Trump declared war on the AI safety panic Monday, dismissing the industry’s apocalyptic warnings as part of a ‘sick conspiracy’ to sabotage America and his legacy,” Axios reports.
“There’s another reason why Americans are wary of AI: They’re afraid of losing their jobs,” Semafor reports.
“According to new Gallup polling, 27% of U.S. workers worry that technology will render their jobs obsolete, a new high.”
“John Thune has urged Congress to act on artificial intelligence for years. Now, as concerns about the rapidly advancing technology explode, the Senate majority leader is moving carefully,” Politico reports.
”A former Commerce Committee chair with a long-running interest in tech policy, Thune is locked in negotiations over a bipartisan AI safety bill. The measure, which he introduced a version of in 2023, would establish some safety and security guardrails for the riskiest models — giving the South Dakota Republican, on paper at least, a solution to Washington’s growing AI nightmare.”
”But the reality is much messier. Despite growing alarm bells from industry insiders about the potentially catastrophic fallout of runaway AI, Republicans and Democrats remain far apart on how stringent a regulatory framework should be — particularly if it overrides state safety laws.”
“President Donald Trump met privately with OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman backstage at the Republican midterm convention on Thursday, days after a former researcher for the company publicly accused both it and rival Anthropic of acting irresponsibly and ‘gambling with our lives,'” MS NOW reports.
“China criticized calls from leading U.S. technology executives to put the brakes on artificial intelligence development and impose tighter curbs on Chinese model makers,” Bloomberg reports.
Said Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun: “Fearmongering, confrontation and vicious competition will only disrupt the process of global AI governance and serve the interests of no one.”
“Equity investors largely yawned Monday at warnings about AI wiping out humanity, suggesting traders aren’t pricing in an existential threat,” Axios reports.
“President Donald Trump unexpectedly called into a business and technology conference through Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s cell phone and dismissed urgent warnings from those inside the artificial intelligence industry as a ‘hoax,'” the Washington Sun reports.
Said Trump, on speakerphone: “The robots will not be taking over. The AI will not be taking over the rest of the world. The whole thing is a hoax.”
Bloomberg: Nvidia CEO puts Trump on speakerphone while downplaying AI risks.
Taegan Goddard
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire -- which for more than two decades has been one of the nation's most influential political news sites.
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