The decision of Sanders and Bannon, who are on opposite ends of America's ideological divide, to speak at the same gathering on Tuesday underscores how concerns over AI and data centers are cutting across party lines and producing unlikely political bedfellows.
Trump on Monday downplayed concerns expressed by industry leaders over the weekend about the misuse of artificial intelligence harming people, saying the U.S. already has guardrails in place for the powerful technology.
Backing Trump's position on Tuesday, Republican U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson said there cannot be a moratorium on artificial intelligence development without losing the competitive edge to China and that AI companies can regulate themselves.
"They can self-regulate. They don't need the government to tell them to slow it down. If they want to slow it down, they should," Johnson told reporters.
The view that regulations will harm U.S. companies' ability to compete with their Chinese counterparts is shared by tech executives, including Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.
Recent surveys have found majorities of Americans worry the technology could be used to eliminate jobs, raise costs for families or otherwise cause social harm.
Residents in several states have also challenged proposals for new data centers, a critical component of the AI boom. According to a Reuters/Ipsos poll published in June, 77% of Americans worry AI-driven data centers will raise electricity costs.
Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon captured public attention last week when he said he resigned from the company, in part because the "people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade."
Also on Tuesday, Andrew Ferguson, the chairman of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, expressed suspicions over AI companies seeking antitrust exemptions while they also lobby for new regulations.
Reuters previously reported that U.S. senators are debating a bill that would block states from enforcing their own laws governing certain risks posed by AI models. Previously, efforts to restrict state AI laws failed in the U.S. Senate.
Sanders and Bannon addressed the same event as AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, who leads the largest federation of labor unions in the U.S.
Sanders, along with House progressive Rep. Greg Casar, has called for the U.S. to pass legislation halting development of AI tools that are capable of "overthrowing or undermining the U.S. government," until the government creates a new agency to police the technology. Casar and Sanders have not released specifics.
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