Senators Came to Their Senses on AI Regulation Ban
The states have stepped in repeatedly to fill the void created by inaction in Washington and have a vital role to play.
AI CEOs like Sam Altman are happy with less regulation.
Photographer: Nathan Howard/Bloomberg
Some sense has prevailed in the Senate — a 99-1 vote against a provision in its huge tax and spending bill that would have banned state-level artificial-intelligence laws for the next 10 years. It’s been just 944 dizzying days since ChatGPT was launched into the world — imagine what might have happened over the next 3,653.
A last-gasp effort to amend the bill, which included reducing 10 years to five, also failed. The new wording would have been more onerous than the original, decimating existing state laws on facial recognition and data privacy. New laws will need to tackle AI-triggered issues on discrimination, recruitment and mental health. The matter is simply too urgent to be left only in Washington’s hands. Senators rightly saw through the moratorium as doing the bidding of big tech companies that want free rein to do as they please in the insatiable race to build and sell AI.