Progressive Democrats are pushing to regulate the artificial intelligence industry with a ban on advanced AI and a new federal oversight agency.
Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Representative Greg Casar (D-TX) introduced legislation this week to ban artificial superintelligence, defined as AI considered "smarter-than-human." The bill would pause advanced AI development until a new regulatory body is established.
The legislation would create a Cabinet-level Department of Artificial Intelligence and impose criminal penalties for violations. Corporations could face dissolution, and individuals could face up to 20 years in prison.
Ten House Democrats co-sponsored the bill, including Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA).
Sanders said the issue must shape the 2028 presidential race. "They've got to talk about it in '28, and we have to act immediately when Congress returns," he said. He called on potential 2028 candidates to take clear positions on AI regulation.
Khanna, ranking member of the House Select Committee on Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party, has opposed unregulated AI growth. He has called for a binding treaty with China and international inspections of AI systems and proposed a global pause on self-training AI in a letter to Secretary of State Marco Rubio.
The push followed the resignation of Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon, who warned that AI could "kill us all by the end of the decade." He accused Anthropic and OpenAI of "gambling with our lives."
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei wrote an open letter this month urging an international slowdown on frontier AI development.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) called on Congress to "immediately" address AI regulation to "slow things down to protect the health, the safety and the well-being of the American people." Jeffries has not endorsed a specific plan. His office declined to comment on whether he supports the Sanders-Casar legislation.
The Sanders-Casar bill faces steep odds in a Republican-controlled Congress, where lawmakers have struggled to reach consensus even on less sweeping AI regulations.
