New York wants to go bigger on AI regulation — before its first law even takes effect

Por Madison Fernandez and Marie J. French — POLITICO – TOP Stories

NEW YORK — New York has been among the most aggressive states in the country in trying to police artificial intelligence, passing pioneering legislation designed to put guardrails around the rapidly developing technology.

Now, before its landmark AI safety law has even taken effect, Gov. Kathy Hochul and key Democratic lawmakers are saying New York needs to go further — as fears about increasingly powerful AI intensify and President Donald Trump resists calls for new federal restrictions.

“I believe we have an obligation to ensure that technological progress does not come at our own peril,” Hochul told reporters after a Tuesday event in New York City. “So while Washington refuses to act, here in New York we’re stepping up.”

Hochul pointed to the RAISE Act, which goes into effect in January, and a one-year data center moratorium she issued in July as evidence that New York is acting aggressively to protect the public.

The governor added that she will find “additional actions that we can take at the state level to lead the way in the absence of leadership from Washington” — though she did not specify what that might look like.

While some in Washington are eager to implement restrictions to slow down AI and bolster protections, Trump has tried to shut down those efforts, calling the AI dooming a “HOAX.”

Hochul negotiated changes to the RAISE Act to make it more palatable to the tech industry and more closely aligned to California’s AI legislation before agreeing to sign the bill in December. The governor said she hasn’t had conversations with legislators in recent days regarding AI, but Democratic lawmakers are already debating additional proposals to consider when they reconvene in Albany next year.

Sen. Kristen Gonzalez, chair of the Senate Internet and Technology committee, called out the leaders of AI companies who are raising concerns about the pace of technological advances for “hypocrisy,” since they’ve fought state-level regulatory proposals.

“I don’t think we can trust the same people who got us into this mess to get us out of it,” she said.

Gonzalez said she’s focused on a “rights-based” framework to protect people as AI and other technologies develop.

“Focusing on the fundamental rights that we are protecting — and also the maximum amount of liability and transparency and accountability for these companies — will create a future-proof framework where we are the ones writing the rules for ourselves and not these big tech companies,” she said.

Hochul still has some AI-focused bills on her desk, including one placing limits on chatbots for minors that Gonzalez sponsored.

Brian Romero, a Democratic Assembly candidate who’s almost certain to win his New York City seat in November, floated the idea of a state level ban on “superintelligence,” similar to the national proposal backed by Sen. Bernie Sanders.

Romero, who was previously a staffer for Gonzalez, said he was looking to get the conversation started on the big swings lawmakers and the governor could take next year on the issue.

“We can’t just wait for the federal government. We all have to look at these various pieces, whether it’s chatbots, whether it is catastrophic risk, frontier model development,” Romero said.

“We need to be introducing the larger concepts of this broader conversation into the political sphere now,” he added. “The governor needs to be taking this very seriously for whatever her state of the state proposals are going to be.”

The debate over what comes next is unfolding as New York is already expanding its scrutiny of AI beyond the models themselves, including the enormous data centers needed to power them. Hochul’s administration on Tuesday also rolled out a framework for communities to negotiate with data center developers. The guidance suggests communities seek a minimum investment in community priorities of $1 million per megawatt from developers, which the state’s leading business group has criticized. It also recommends that local governments “think carefully” about signing non-disclosure agreements with data center developers and says they should be limited in scope. Some Democratic lawmakers want to ban such agreements outright instead.

Lawmakers have criticized the non-binding nature of the guidance, pushing for a more aggressive approach to protect communities from the energy-guzzling megastructures.

Democratic lawmakers also want Hochul to sign their more aggressive data center regulatory package which includes a longer moratorium than Hochul enacted through executive order in July and other requirements for the large-scale projects.

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani expressed support Tuesday for a nationwide data center moratorium, backing the position endorsed by Sanders. But the democratic socialist also said he thinks the federal government needs to go further to protect the public.

“We’re talking about companies that are bringing up the end of humanity as a possible outcome of this technology, and it has been a very flip response to that level of concern,” Mamdani said, adding that he would also like to see federal policies related to slowing down “the pace of development” of AI.

Chris Sommerfeldt contributed to this report.

Fonte: POLITICO – TOP Stories