Lawmakers from both parties are celebrating the Senate’s decision to cut a provision that would have put a 10-year pause on state-level regulation of artificial intelligence from the reconciliation bill hours before it passed.
California lawmakers are among those who are most relieved that they narrowly avoided this provision getting tucked into the legislation. The AI provision would have disproportionately affected California, where most advanced AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic are located and legislators are eager to regulate the new technology given its prominence in the tech industry.
“Congress finally came to its senses and voted overwhelmingly to remove the AI moratorium provision,” California state Sen. Josh Becker, a lawmaker who has pushed for regulation of AI in California, told NOTUS in a statement.