Congress

Voters are waking up on AI safety. So are these Senate Republicans.

Published

4 weeks ago

September 21, 2026

House Republicans have left Washington till November. President Donald Trump is decrying concerns about the issue as a “HOAX.” But a few Senate Republicans are trying to nudge their party into doing something — anything — about artificial intelligence.

There isn’t much binding them together aside from the “R” next to their names, but Sens. John Curtis, Josh Hawley and John Kennedy have each been closely attuned as voters suddenly grow alarmed — not only about the data centers powering the AI industry, but the recent insider warnings about potentially catastrophic consequences for humanity.

Curtis is a Utah moderate who has been among the few in his party to take seriously scientists’ warnings about climate change. Hawley is a populist Missouri conservative who has long been skeptical of Silicon Valley business titans. And Kennedy’s simple-Louisiana-country-lawyer persona belies a relatively sophisticated understanding of frontier AI developments.

The trio is not coordinating efforts, but their individual actions were part of a clear push from the GOP’s back benches over the past week to get party leaders to wake up and address an issue they believe could tilt the upcoming midterms and certainly the presidential and congressional races in 2028.

“We might want to be on the side of voters — just a thought,” Hawley said, noting that while he has his own “views” on how Washington should respond, party leaders have offered members no guidance on how to approach the topic.

Hawley is taking matters in his own hands this week by convening a hearing in the Judiciary subcommittee he chairs on AI-powered Flock cameras. He’s also using another subcommittee gavel to investigate OpenAI over the runaway model that saw hundreds of rogue agents escape testing and hack another tech company.

Both Curtis and Hawley have teamed up with Democrats, who have generally been more aggressive in calling for AI safety measures — particularly since a former OpenAI and Anthropic employee went public saying advanced models could “could kill us all by the end of the decade.”

Hawley and Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) — who both sit on the Judiciary and Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs committee — pushed congressional leaders last week to hold a vote on their “risk evaluation” legislation, arguing that “frontier AI demands frontier legislation.”

Curtis, meanwhile, joined with a fellow Commerce Committee member, Sen. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.), to call for “immediate public hearings” to “work through solutions that maintain America’s competitive edge in development while ensuring that these technologies serve human interests and remain fully under human control.”

Curtis said in an interview lawmakers need to “show that we’re adults in the room, that we can talk about this, that we can find solutions.”

“I don’t want to say we’re making it too hard, but I think we’re making it too hard,” Curtis said. “And what I mean by that is, there’s a lot of false narratives out there — we need to just jump on this immediately and clamp it down, or we need to not touch it, and all of that only I think causes anxiety back home.”

Both efforts could be seen as attempts to jolt more senior senators who are in positions to advance AI-related legislation. So far they are treading carefully amid skepticism among Senate Republicans that they will ever be able to overcome Trump’s opposition on AI regulations and recalcitrance among House GOP leaders, according to three people granted anonymity to describe private conversations.

They include Judiciary Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), who indicated in an interview that he had no plans to hold hearings or take other action related to AI.

“I think that I’d be getting into the jurisdiction of the Commerce Committee,” Grassley said, directing further questions to Commerce Chair Ted Cruz (R-Texas).

Cruz has been more deeply engaged than Grassley in AI matters, but his plans for action remain uncertain. He said last week he is still hoping to hold a committee vote on AI safety legislation this month before the Senate leaves for the final stretch of pre-midterm campaigning.

Cruz is engaged in negotiating a revised version of an AI safety bill that Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) first introduced in 2023. But multiple Commerce Committee Republicans said they have so far heard zilch behind the scenes about what the committee could do, and some doubt they will be able to get an agreement in time to act before the Senate leaves — possibly as soon as the end of this week.

While Thune himself has been the most engaged on AI issues among top GOP leaders, he still advocated for a “light touch” on industry regulation last week while acknowledging the “considerable amount of interest” among lawmakers in taking action.

Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming, the No. 2 Senate Republican, said — as Hawley suggested — that he isn’t giving members guidance on how to talk about AI.

“People have opinions and they’re going to make their opinions known and talk to their voters,” he said.

And then there’s Kennedy, who recently said the industry is run by “high-IQ stupid people” and was the rare Republican who attended a briefing put together by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) last week to meet with AI experts to talk about potential safeguards for the technology.

He took his AI concerns straight to the Senate floor Wednesday, seeking to pass legislation this week that would require companies to install so-called “kill switches” for their AI models. In a speech before seeking unanimous consent to pass the bill, he delivered a homespun but technically detailed summation of the OpenAI swarm attack and the risks posed by “recursive self-improvement.”

His bill was blocked by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who instead proposed creating a panel to make recommendations about potential guardrails.

Kennedy said appointing a committee would be “the weenie way out” after warning his colleagues from the Senate floor that Americans were growing “very skeptical” of AI and the tech titans behind it.

“They’ve seen this vampire movie before,” he said.

In a separate interview, Kennedy said he hadn’t heard “anything” about action in the Senate to address AI and that lawmakers who ignore the growing voter uproar around the issue were courting peril.

“We really need to send a memo around explaining we’ve got midterm elections coming,” he said. “I may send that out.”

Congress

Bernie Moreno says GOP needs to prep for ‘Last Supper’ reconciliation bill

Published

13 hours ago

October 15, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Sen. Bernie Moreno said Thursday he expects the Senate to move a party-line legislative package after the midterm elections — especially if Democrats flip one or both chambers.

“We will do a reconciliation bill — one way or the other we will,” the Ohio Republican told reporters at the Capitol, referring to the simple-majority budget process. “Obviously, if we lose control of Congress, it’ll be the Last Supper.”

Such a bill, he added, would be “giant” and would include “all the Republican priorities that we can get done.”

The House approved a framework for a party-line bill over the summer that includes war funding, farm aid and election integrity incentives. But the push has so far run aground in the Senate

Moreno said the threat of imminent Democratic control of either the House or Senate would jumpstart matters — and potentially push Republicans to include a debt-ceiling increase as well.

The borrowing limit is set to be reached sometime next year, and a Democratic majority could have significant leverage to demand concessions as part of any deal — something the GOP could forestall by acting in the lame-duck session.

“I mean, nobody wants to see a debt default,” Moreno said. “That would be 1929 on steroids.”

Rep. Rob Wittman (R-Va.) also told reporters on Capitol Hill that a new reconciliation bill “has to happen” after the election but warned against expanding the scope of the House framework.

“I think you have to go with the one that we’ve got,” he told reporters. “The Senate needs to act and get the job done.”

A senior member of the Armed Services Committee, Wittman said the legislation is “key to restock our weapons magazine” and “should be the main focus when [members] get back.”

Moreno said if Democrats win control of both chambers, Republicans should stay in session nonstop to pass GOP legislation — which could be a tall order given worries about poor post-election attendance.

“If we lose the House and the Senate, we should be here from Nov. 9 until Dec. 31 with no break at all,” Moreno said. “Like, we’ll have turkeys here for Thanksgiving because we have to get this done.”

Congress

Authorities investigate ‘suspicious substances’ mailed to congressional offices

Published

13 hours ago

October 15, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Authorities are investigating letters containing “suspicious substances” sent to multiple Capitol Hill offices, according to a notice sent to senior congressional staff.

“Law enforcement officials are working to intercept any additional letters before they are delivered, however, it is possible that some letters may reach their destinations,” says a memo from the Senate Sergeant at Arms and obtained by Blue Light News.

The Capitol Police, FBI and U.S. Postal Inspection Service are involved in the probe, according to the notice, which said additional letters have been mailed to other addresses across the U.S., including lawmakers’ state and district offices.

It is unclear if any of the suspicious letters reached Capitol Hill. Letters and packages sent to congressional offices are subject to off-site screening under a system established after the 2001 anthrax attacks.

The memo includes a photo of one of the suspicious envelopes and warns staff to keep an eye out for warning signs, such as messy handwriting or postmarks that do not match the return address. The memo was first reported by Bloomberg Government.

Suspicious letters were also sent to state election offices and election officials, according to a joint statement Wednesday from the National Association of Secretaries of State and National Association of State Election Directors.

They said they are working with law enforcement to protect “personnel and facilities” and that contingency plans and security measures are in place to respond to threats “while maintaining essential election operations.”

House and Senate mail is processed in two separate Maryland facilities where materials are screened, irradiated and tested for a variety of substances before they are sent to the Capitol complex — a process that can add as much as two weeks to delivery.

The process has proved effective in the past, catching a string of suspected explosive devices sent to prominent Democrats in 2018 and a ricin-laced envelope sent to Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) in 2013.

Members’ district and state offices have the option to send mail for screening before it is delivered or to contract with a similar mail security system.

Jordain Carney contributed to this report.

Congress

Bipartisan House group urges Trump to enforce Russia sanctions, scrap diesel deal

Published

14 hours ago

October 15, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

A bipartisan group of House lawmakers urged President Donald Trump to follow through on the Russia sanctions law he signed last month, warning on Thursday against giving Moscow economic relief as a key enforcement deadline approaches.

In a letter led by Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.) and shared first with Blue Light News, 22 House lawmakers asked Trump to fully implement the sanctions law named after the late Sen. Lindsey Graham by Oct. 18 and scrap his administration’s recent Russian diesel deal.

“As Russia prepares to wage a fifth winter campaign against Ukraine, the United States has an opportunity to reinvigorate peace efforts by placing maximum pressure on Vladimir Putin and the governments and networks that finance his war,” the lawmakers wrote in the letter sent to Trump, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent.

The House lawmakers called for the Trump administration to apply sanctions “to their fullest extent and without delay” against Russian officials, oligarchs and banks financing the war — as well as the foreign banks, shadow fleet operators and intermediaries helping Moscow evade restrictions.

Included among the lawmakers who signed Thursday’s letter are Republican Reps. Don Bacon (Neb.), Brian Fitzpatrick (Pa.), Michael McCaul (Texas), Dan Newhouse (Wash.) and Joe Wilson (S.C.), along with Democrats including Reps. Steny Hoyer (Md.), Marcy Kaptur (Ohio) and Jared Golden (Maine) — among others.

The lawmakers’ demands Thursday add to growing bipartisan pressure on Trump over his deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin, after the president announced on Friday that Russia would supply hundreds of thousands of tons of diesel to the “American and Global Marketplace.”

They also requested details on which sanctions and tariffs will take effect before Oct. 18, whether any provisions will be delayed or waived, and how the administration reconciles the diesel license with the existing statutory ban on Russian energy imports.

“Putin has repeatedly shown that he responds to pressure, not goodwill,” the House members wrote. “This will make clear that American resolve is bipartisan and durable, and that the cost of continuing this war will only grow until Russia comes to the negotiating table.

The White House, the State Department and the Treasury Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Trump defended the agreement Tuesday as “a deal for the world,” saying the diesel would enter global markets rather than go directly to the U.S. The move comes as the president scrambles to try to bring down fuel prices ahead of the midterms.

The Iran war — now in its seventh month — has contributed to the surge in costs, with the average price of diesel peaking at a record $6.53 per gallon in September, according to AAA.