Political debate over AI intensifies amid warnings about ‘catastrophic risk’

Noah Berger for AWS/Reuters

The debate around artificial intelligence is ramping up in Washington, with Democratic lawmakers sounding alarms on the dangers they say the technology poses and Republican leaders suggesting those concerns are inflated and secondary to winning the AI race with China.

Some Democratic lawmakers last week pressured House Speaker Mike Johnson to reconvene the chamber immediately to work on AI regulation, citing what they describe as the “catastrophic risk posed by advanced artificial intelligence.” But the Louisiana Republican on Sunday resisted those calls, instead saying industry leaders should meet with lawmakers to find “balance” in any potential guardrails.

“If Congress just races in and does some sort of emergency session to try to regulate AI, we will lose the race to China, and that is a threat to every single American,” Johnson said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Meanwhile, former President Barack Obama told Democrats to make artificial intelligence regulation a central part of their agenda during a private fundraiser Thursday, warning that the technology could be dangerous “if we don’t get on top of it.”

In a fireside chat with House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Obama said whoever runs in the 2028 presidential election should have a “very clear plan” on AI, adding that he saw the need for a “blueprint” on AI guardrails even at the end of his presidency a decade ago.

“Certainly, if I were running for president next year, this would be one of my central agendas, and I would have a very clear plan, and I would talk about this, and I would say, ‘Here’s our plan for safety, here’s our plan for making sure our kids are not corrupted by this,’” he said, per excerpts of the remarks provided to CNN by his office. Obama’s remarks were first reported by the New York Times .

Jonathan Ernst/Reuters

Concerns over the rapid acceleration of AI reached a fever pitch after Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei wrote in a 3,800-word essay Saturday that the race to develop artificial intelligence is in dire need of a slowdown. The call to action came after an OpenAI test model breached the Hugging Face online platform, deepening concerns about cybersecurity.

In an exclusive interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Saturday, Amodei called on industry leaders to work together to avoid “the wrong paths” and the possibility of AI harming humanity.

One Anthropic researcher, Jacob Coxon , resigned from the firm over worries that the industry wasn’t doing enough to prevent AI from destroying humanity by the end of the decade.

Obama said Democrats need a plan to get their agenda on AI underway should they win the House majority in this year’s midterms.

Speaking to Jeffries, who is presumed to be speaker of the House should Democrats prevail in November, Obama said, “Once you are speaker, I would strongly urge that the Democrats put together a framework for a very public conversation, and you can break it out into three or four or five issues.”

Obama stressed that the framework should be centered on the reality that the technology can’t be stuffed “back into a box.”

“This is something that is moving very fast in private hands, and if we don’t get on top of it, I think can be dangerous. If we do get on top of it, I do think it’s beneficial,” Obama said, laying out examples of AI’s potential use in drug development and finding pathways to a clean energy future.

“We don’t want to shut off those opportunities, but we have to understand that this is a tool,” he said.

Jeffries agreed with the former president in a statement provided to CNN on Sunday.

“President Obama is correct that decisive action must be taken on Artificial Intelligence,” he said, adding, “In the majority, we will move urgently on this issue with a legislative response that recognizes the importance of American companies continuing to lead in the Artificial Intelligence area, while putting in place meaningful guardrails that protect the American people from bad actors and the very real damage that can be done to humanity.”

Samuel Boivin/NurPhoto/Getty Images

Jeffries also accused Republicans of having “abdicated their responsibility to govern” and said Democrats “will not repeat their error.”

A source familiar with Obama’s thinking said the former president sees Amodei’s letter and similar reaction from other tech moguls as an encouraging development.

But President Donald Trump waved off their concerns, saying he is not worried about any existential threat posed by AI, focusing instead on the US winning in its development of the technology over China.

“We’re leading China in AI. We’re the most sophisticated country in the world, and frankly, I want to keep it that way,” Trump said to reporters at the Amgen Irish Open on Sunday.

About the concerns expressed by Democrats and others over the technology, the president said, “I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up that shouldn’t be bringing it up, and they’re bringing up things that won’t happen.”

One of Trump’s top economic advisers, Kevin Hassett, also rejected the calls for slowing the technology down, saying on Sunday the bigger concern is a scenario in which a “malevolent actor has access to an AI that’s better than the one we have that can protect us.”

Hassett, the National Economic Council director, said on “State of the Union” the White House may hold meetings this week about addressing Amodei’s concerns, but he did not specify whether Trump had floated greater safeguards.

“I have concerns that if we don’t win AI, we’re going to be put in a very bad position,” Hassett said. “We are leading China right now.”

CNN’s Alison Main and Molly English contributed to this report.

Noah Berger 为 AWS/路透社撰稿

在华盛顿，围绕人工智能的争论愈演愈烈，民主党议员们对这项技术带来的危险发出警告，而共和党领导人则认为这些担忧被夸大了，而且比起在人工智能竞赛中战胜中国，这些担忧更为重要。

上周，一些民主党议员向众议院议长迈克·约翰逊施压，要求他立即重新召开众议院会议，讨论人工智能监管问题，理由是他们所说的“先进人工智能带来的灾难性风险”。但这位来自路易斯安那州的共和党人周日拒绝了这些呼吁，反而表示行业领袖应该与立法者会面，在任何潜在的监管措施中寻求“平衡”。

约翰逊在 CNN 的“国情咨文”节目中表示：“如果国会仓促召开紧急会议来试图监管人工智能，我们将输给中国，这对每一个美国人来说都是一个威胁。”

与此同时，前总统巴拉克·奥巴马周四在一次私人筹款活动中告诉民主党人，要将人工智能监管作为其议程的核心部分，并警告说，如果我们不加以控制，这项技术可能会很危险。

在与众议院民主党领袖哈基姆·杰弗里斯的炉边谈话中，奥巴马表示，无论谁参加 2028 年总统大选，都应该有一个关于人工智能的“非常清晰的计划”，并补充说，早在十年前他总统任期结束时，他就看到了制定人工智能安全保障“蓝图”的必要性。

“当然，如果我明年竞选总统，这将会是我的核心议程之一，我会制定一个非常清晰的计划，我会谈论这个问题，我会说，‘这是我们的安全计划，这是我们确保我们的孩子不受其腐蚀的计划，’”他说道。以上内容摘自奥巴马办公室提供给CNN的讲话节选。奥巴马的讲话最初由《纽约时报》报道。

乔纳森·恩斯特/路透社

在Anthropic首席执行官达里奥·阿莫迪（Dario Amodei）周六发表了一篇长达3800字的文章后，人们对人工智能快速发展的担忧达到了白热化程度。文章指出，人工智能的研发竞赛亟需放缓。此前，OpenAI的一个测试模型入侵了Hugging Face在线平台，加剧了人们对网络安全的担忧。

周六，阿莫迪在接受 CNN 安德森·库珀的独家采访时，呼吁行业领袖们共同努力，避免走上“错误的道路”，防止人工智能对人类造成伤害。

人类学研究所的一名研究员雅各布·考克森（Jacob Coxon）因担心该行业在阻止人工智能在本十年末毁灭人类方面做得不够而从该公司辞职。

奥巴马表示，如果民主党在今年的中期选举中赢得众议院多数席位，他们需要制定一个计划来启动其人工智能议程。

奥巴马对杰弗里斯说：“如果你当选议长，我强烈敦促民主党人制定一个公开对话的框架，你可以将其分解为三到四个或五个议题。”杰弗里斯被认为是如果民主党在11月获胜的话，将成为众议院议长。

奥巴马强调，该框架应以“技术无法被重新装回盒子里”这一现实为中心。

奥巴马说：“这项技术在私人领域发展迅猛，如果我们不加以控制，我认为这很危险。如果我们能够控制住它，我认为这将大有裨益。”他列举了人工智能在药物研发和寻找清洁能源未来途径方面的潜在用途。

“我们不想关闭这些机会，但我们必须明白这只是一种工具，”他说。

杰弗里斯在周日提供给 CNN 的一份声明中表示同意这位前总统的观点。

“奥巴马总统说得对，必须在人工智能领域采取果断行动，”他说道，“作为多数派，我们将紧急推进这一问题，通过立法回应，承认美国公司继续在人工智能领域保持领先地位的重要性，同时建立有意义的保障措施，保护美国人民免受不良行为者的侵害，以及可能对人类造成的切实损害。”

Samuel Boivin/NurPhoto/Getty Images

杰弗里斯还指责共和党人“放弃了执政的责任”，并表示民主党人“不会重蹈覆辙”。

一位熟悉奥巴马想法的消息人士称，这位前总统认为阿莫迪的信件以及其他科技巨头的类似反应是一个令人鼓舞的进展。

但唐纳德·特朗普总统对他们的担忧不以为然，称他并不担心人工智能带来的任何生存威胁，而是将重点放在美国在该技术发展方面战胜中国上。

“我们在人工智能领域领先于中国。我们是世界上最先进的国家，坦白说，我希望保持这种状态，”特朗普周日在安进爱尔兰公开赛上对记者说。

针对民主党人和其他人对这项技术表达的担忧，总统表示：“我认为有很多负面势力在提出这个问题，他们不应该提出这个问题，他们提出的事情根本不会发生。”

特朗普的一位高级经济顾问凯文·哈塞特也拒绝了放慢这项技术发展的呼吁。他在周日表示，更令人担忧的是“恶意行为者获得比我们现有的、能够保护我们的人工智能更好的人工智能”的情况。

国家经济委员会主任哈塞特在“国情咨文”节目中表示，白宫本周可能会召开会议，讨论解决阿莫迪的担忧，但他没有具体说明特朗普是否提出了更严格的保障措施。

哈塞特说：“我担心如果我们不能在人工智能领域取得胜利，我们将陷入非常不利的境地。目前我们领先于中国。”

CNN的艾莉森·梅因和莫莉·英格利希对本报道亦有贡献。