AI amendment passes committee, but Democrats say they’ll fix it later

Some experts IT Brew has spoken with over the past few months have called for more tech regulation—but Texas Sen. Ted Cruz’s latest intervention in how the government manages AI was probably not what they were referring to.

Critics charge that the senator’s amendment was aimed at undoing protections in President Joe Biden’s October 2023 executive order laying down rules and restrictions on the emerging technology.

Cruz, the committee’s ranking member, proposed a number of amendments to The Future of AI Innovation Act, a bill sponsored by Sen. Maria Cantwell that passed the Senate Commerce Committee on July 31. The legislation establishes the National Institute of Standards and Technology’s AI Safety Institute.

“This Cruz amendment doesn’t just destroy the bill that Cantwell is trying to pass,” Brown University Professor of Data Science Suresh Venkatasubramanian tweeted. “It also guts the AI EO, the OMB guidance and any future action by the federal govt on AI.”

Priorities. The Cruz amendment that passed through a voice vote demanded a technology directive barring generative AI from recommending or promoting the idea that certain people are racist or that the United States is itself racist, preventing modifications to systems to allow for protections of certain classes of people, as well as restricting development of systems in an equitable manner.

Democrats found the ranking member’s amendments frustrating, a committee spokesperson told FedScoop in a statement. Cruz “is not for making sure AI is developed in a way to protect consumers from harms, ensure their safety or defend their constitutional protections,” the spokesperson wrote. And there will be time to adjust the bill, they said.

“Rather than giving the senator a platform to amplify divisive rhetoric and delay committee progress,” the statement continued, “the Chair accepted the amendment—knowing there will be many opportunities to fix the legislation, and with the support of the other Republican Senators.”