Tech companies must be responsible for AI safety, Mike Johnson says, not Congress
Por Cheyanne M. Daniels — POLITICO – TOP Stories
House Speaker Mike Johnson on Sunday said he would support talks with tech leaders on artificial intelligence, but insisted that developers — not Congress — are responsible for ensuring their products are safe.
In an interview with CNN’s “State of the Union,” the Louisiana Republican argued Congress has already instituted AI guardrails and that “there is an obvious corporate responsibility that the people who are creating these models have to ensure that their products are safe.”
“We cannot put a moratorium on this because China will overlap us, and that’s the challenge,” said Johnson. “It’s national security balanced with the immediate security of making sure the models are safe.”
Johnson’s comments come just a day after top executives at three of the nation’s leading AI labs urged the industry to slow down the development of advanced AI models. The warning from Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, xAI CEO Elon Musk and OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman followed the departure of several researchers at both Anthropic and Google who warned last week that capable AI systems “could kill us all by the end of the decade.”
But President Donald Trump has been a staunch supporter of expanding AI capabilities, arguing the AI arms race against China is one that the U.S. must win.
“Well I say this,” Trump said Sunday during his visit to Ireland, “we’re leading China on AI. We’re the most sophisticated country in the world and frankly I want to keep it that way, because whoever wins AI wins. And we can put guardrails, and we can do this and that, but I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up, and they’re bringing up things that won’t happen.”
Congress has remained split on how to tackle implementing guardrails on the advanced technology, with many Republicans echoing Trump and Johnson’s concerns around China’s developments.
Still, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Sunday told ABC’s “This Week” his caucus will meet on Tuesday “and a high priority will be action on artificial intelligence.”
“We should take decisive action now so that we can slow down, as the CEOs have recently acknowledged, slow down the pace of development in order to protect the American people and ensure that A.I. is proceeding safely,” said Jeffries, though he did not clarify what type of action legislators could take.
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas) last week demanded the U.S. implement ban on superintelligence, a type of AI that far exceeds humans’ cognitive capabilities, and pause all AI development until the government could establish an AI vetting process.
Johnson, for his part, said he would meet with Amodei, Musk and Altman on Monday if possible.
“We’ve got to summon everybody together,” Johnson said. “I’ve talked to the president about this as well. They probably should be summoned together at the White House. And I think we need to go in a big room, close the door and sort this out. And I’ll be the one pushing for it.”
Fonte: POLITICO – TOP Stories
