Keller: Artificial intelligence provision in spending bill has unlikely allies lining up to fight it
The opinions expressed below are Jon Keller's, not those of WBZ, CBS News or Paramount Global.
The "big, beautiful bill" passed by the House contains an artificial intelligence provision that has unlikely allies lining up to fight it.
Artificial intelligence - or AI - is rapidly becoming a key part of our daily lives, providing lightning-fast information and helping machines operate more efficiently.
Halting AI regulation
But like social media before it, AI is also being misused, with many states moving to stop that with new laws. They're all jeopardized by language tucked deep inside the House version of President Trump's so-called "big, beautiful" tax and spending bill that would bar states from regulating artificial intelligence for the next 10 years.
It's a move that has left-wing Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren and right-wing Georgia Republican Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene singing the same time. "Republicans just threw the software companies a lifeline," says Warren, and Greene accuses the authors of the provision of "allowing AI to run rampant and destroying federalism in the process."
The halting of AI regulation was just a rhetorical concept at a Senate Commerce committee hearing in early May.
"To lead in AI, the U.S. cannot allow regulation, even the supposedly benign kind, to choke innovation or adoption," declared Sen. Ted Cruz.
And with at least 16 states having already passed AI regulations, the tech moguls on hand loved the idea of overriding them.
"Our stance is that we need to give adult users a lot of freedom to use AI in the way that they want to use it and to trust them to be responsible with the tool," said Open AI CEO and founder Sam Altman.
Calls for guardrails on AI
But like social media before it, AI is often used irresponsibly, fueling misinformation, political manipulation, and pornographic deepfakes.
"Twenty-plus years ago there was a small startup in Cambridge called Facebook and we all thought it was cute and fun," recalled Massachusetts State Sen. Barry Finegold, who is co-sponsoring AI regulation here. "But now Meta says, they'll even admit, that one out of three women have body issues because of their algorithm."
Finegold is one of 260 state legislators from both parties and all states who sent a letter to Congress opposing the regulation moratorium.
"We are all about seeing the growth of AI, we want more companies to come here to Massachusetts, we think it's going to do dynamic things in biotech and so many others," said Finegold. "But what's so wrong with having guardrails out there to protect the public?"
Just a couple of weeks ago President Trump signed into law the "Take it Down Act" which requires platforms to remove pornographic deepfakes and other intimate images within 48 hours of a victim's complaint. And the unusually-bipartisan outcry against this ban on state regulation shows how the tech lobbyists may have overreached this time.
But this episode is part of a larger, long-running debate about the proper balance between regulation and economic growth, and that tug-of-war isn't ending anytime soon.
