Americans are divided on whether it’s acceptable to fall behind other countries in the race to develop advanced artificial intelligence. So is Congress.<\/p>\n

A new POLITICO Poll<\/a> finds that Americans broadly recognize serious risks from frontier AI models, but many \u2014 particularly President Donald Trump\u2019s voters \u2014 also prioritize maintaining a lead over other countries, including China.<\/p>\n

Even as 63% of the poll’s respondents said there\u2019s a real possibility that AI could destroy humanity<\/a>, they\u2019re split on whether it\u2019s acceptable to slow down and potentially fall behind in order to mitigate that risk.<\/p>\n

A plurality, 43%, say it is acceptable for the U.S. to fall behind other countries if that means developing AI more responsibly and securely, while 37% take the opposite view, saying the U.S. should not stand down, even if that requires taking risks. Voters who backed Trump in 2024 favor the competition-first position by 50% to 38%.<\/p>\n

That split is already playing out on Capitol Hill as AI safety zooms to the center of congressional conversations. With legislation only slowly taking shape, fear of international competition stands to be a major point of tension during any bipartisan negotiations \u2014 with most lawmakers\u2019 views divided closely along party lines.<\/p>\n

Many Republican lawmakers said in interviews this week that pausing AI development could give China an opening to overtake U.S. capabilities. Democrats are also looking over their shoulders at Chinese advances, but they are cautioning that competition is not a reason for Congress to avoid instituting AI guardrails.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe AI race is not an arms race that you win,\u201d Rep. Greg Casar<\/a> (D-Texas) said during Wednesday\u2019s Blue Light News Decoded Summit. \u201cIt\u2019s an arms race that we need to end, and we need to protect the American people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Casar, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, has teamed up with Sen. Bernie Sanders<\/a> (I-Vt.) in calling for a ban on \u201csuperintelligence\u201d to stave off the existential threats to humanity \u2014 a concern that bubbled to the fore last week when a former Anthropic researcher warned AI could \u201ckill us all.\u201d<\/p>\n

Senior Republicans are denigrating proposals like Casar\u2019s, arguing that the U.S. cannot risk Chinese AI dominance. Rep. Brett Guthrie<\/a> (R-Ky.), chair of the powerful House committee overseeing the tech industry, said as much at the summit.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe absolutely can\u2019t surrender,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I think that\u2019s what it would be if we stopped AI development.\u201d<\/p>\n

Guthrie further argued AI legislation is too complex to rush and that the Energy and Commerce Committee he leads might not take up AI legislation before next year. That sentiment is in line with Speaker Mike Johnson, who said this week that the U.S. must \u201cmaintain our edge over China.\u201d Meanwhile, Trump has called the AI panic a \u201cHOAX\u201d and said that federal regulations would allow China to leapfrog the U.S.<\/p>\n

Some Republicans have been almost flippant about the dilemma policymakers face in reconciling a potentially dangerous technology with their fear of Chinese competition.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there are going to be killer robots, I\u2019d rather they be American killer robots,\u201d Sen. Ted Cruz<\/a> of Texas said in a recent POLITICO interview<\/a>. Like Guthrie, Cruz chairs a committee overseeing tech matters.<\/p>\n

Among the bipartisan group of lawmakers who have locked arms in warning about the Chinese threat on other fronts, the familiar partisan divide is still emerging on AI regulation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe can lead in innovation and lead in safety,\u201d said Rep. Greg Stanton<\/a> (D-Ariz.), who sits on the bipartisan Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party. \u201cSo if Trump or anyone else comes at it that we can only do one but not the other, he’s not looking at the history of the United States of America.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rep. Don Bacon<\/a> of Nebraska, a moderate Republican China hawk, said he is \u201cvery reluctant to hinder AI\u201d via regulation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey’re going to have to make the good case why we need it,\u201d he said. \u201cWe don’t want to hinder our AI research. We can’t afford to fall behind China.\u201d<\/p>\n

Some, however, are being careful to strike a balanced tone as the AI safety conversation kicks into high gear.<\/p>\n

Rep. John Moolenaar<\/a> (R-Mich.), chair of the House China panel, acknowledged lawmakers \u201cdo have a responsibility for public safety\u201d while saying it was also important to \u201cbeat China when it comes to the AI race.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere’s economic benefits to that,\u201d he said. \u201cThere’s national security issues, but we want to have common sense and a deliberative process.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rep. Josh Gottheimer<\/a> (D-N.J.), an Intelligence Committee member and a co-chair of House Democrats\u2019 AI commission, said China is \u201cnot waiting for anyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you can’t just leave the race, but you need to make sure you do it in the right way,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Opinions are sharper when it comes to Trump\u2019s upcoming meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping next week and whether he should even broach some type of cooperation on AI safety.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don’t trust him,\u201d Rep. Joe Wilson<\/a> (R-S.C.), a senior member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said when asked if Trump should engage with Xi on AI. \u201cI trust Trump.\u201d<\/p>\n

But many Democrats say it\u2019s a mistake to engage in an AI arms race, with some explicitly reaching for analogies with the nuclear arms race that ended in Cold War treaties with a former global rival \u2014 the Soviet Union \u2014 limiting bomb tests and missile deployments.<\/p>\n

Rep. Ted Lieu<\/a> of California, another co-chair of the Democratic AI commission, said Trump could start small by asking Xi to \u201ccommit that they’re never going to let AI launch a nuclear weapon by itself.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are things that we can do to get other countries to follow the lead the U.S. has taken in AI,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Americans are divided on whether it’s acceptable to fall behind other countries in the race to develop advanced artificial intelligence. So is Congress. A new Blue Light News Poll finds that Americans broadly recognize serious risks from frontier AI models, but many \u2014 particularly President Donald Trump\u2019s voters \u2014 also prioritize maintaining a lead over other countries, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27172\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}