The 84-year-old senator is one of the few federal lawmakers taking up the cause of the AI skeptics or “doomers,” as some have labeled the group, who have voiced concerns about AI’s “existential risk to humanity.”
While both Democrats and Republicans alike have embraced the idea that the U.S. is locked in a fierce competition with China, Sanders is arguing the technology’s risks require the opposite approach.
“We’re building a runaway train here,” Sanders told reporters on a call last week. “It’s moving down the track at rapidly expanding acceleration, and we don’t know where it ends up. We don’t know what its impact will be.”
“Do I think Congress is prepared to deal with it? I do not,” he added. “So I’m going to do everything I can to try to generate support for action, bring people together and come up with some rational solutions.”
Sanders began ramping up his messaging on AI late last year, when he first called for a moratorium on data center construction as a means of giving “democracy a chance to catch up” amid the “unregulated sprint” to develop the technology.
He and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) introduced legislation in March that would bar construction of all new data centers until “strong national safeguards are in place,” such as measures preventing mass job displacement and limiting increases in consumer electricity prices.
This comes as data centers have increasingly encountered local pushback and Americans have become more wary about AI.
“For Sen. Sanders, I imagine he thinks that taking this more hard-line stance on AI might fit well with his populist political beliefs and expand his appeal to a wider swath of voters,” Andrew Lokay, a senior research analyst at Beacon Policy Advisors, told The Hill.
Check out the full report at TheHill.com tomorrow morning.
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