Republicans Try To Cram Decade-Long AI Regulation Ban Into Budget Reconciliation Bill

An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: Late last night, House Republicans introduced new language to the Budget Reconciliation bill that will immiserate the lives of millions of Americans by cutting their access to Medicaid, and making life much more difficult for millions more by making them pay higher fees when they seek medical care. While a lot of attention will be justifiably given to these cuts, the bill has also crammed in new language that attempts to entirely stop states from enacting any regulation against artificial intelligence.

'...no State or political subdivision thereof may enforce any law or regulation regulating artificial intelligence models, artificial intelligence systems, or automated decision systems during the 10 year period beginning on the date of the enactment of this Act,' says the text of the bill introduced Sunday night by Congressman Brett Guthrie of Kentucky, Chairman of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. The text of the bill will be considered by the House at the budget reconciliation markup on May 13.

That language of the bill, how it goes on to define AI and other 'automated systems,' and what it considers 'regulation,' is broad enough to cover relatively new generative AI tools and technology that has existed for much longer. In theory, that language will make it impossible to enforce many existing and proposed state laws that aim to protect people from and inform them about AI systems. In theory none of these states will be able to enforce these laws if Republicans manage to pass the Budget Reconciliation bill with this current language.

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