Conservatives prepare attack on Biden’s AI order

The tech lobby, GOP lawmakers and conservative activists are trying to kneecap President Joe Biden’s executive order on artificial intelligence just days before its first major deadlines hit.

Their target: Biden’s use of emergency powers to compel tech companies to provide information to the Commerce Department about advanced AI projects that use immense computing power — a requirement that industry advocates oppose.

The administration argues that the national security threat posed by AI warrants using the Defense Production Act, a law that gives the federal government broad powers over private companies. But to Biden’s critics, the effort to shape Washington’s response to a 21st century technology by tapping a 74-year-old law is a textbook case of executive overreach.

“There’s not a national emergency” on AI, Sen. Mike Rounds told POLITICO. The South Dakota Republican has worked closely with Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to draft AI legislation but said Biden’s use of the DPA to regulate AI is “not necessarily what the Defense Production Act was made for in the first place.”