News: A bipartisan Senate duo wants the Trump administration to save parts of the Biden administration’s AI framework to ensure artificial intelligence technology is “built at home.”
In a letter to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) ask that any new rules developed by Commerce maintain incentives for companies to keep the majority of their computing infrastructure in the United States and include “robust security guardrails” on data centers overseas.
“These requirements serve as an important backstop against outsourcing our core advantage in AI overseas,” Warren and Rounds wrote. “If left unchecked, outsourcing could move the center of gravity for cutting-edge AI training and deployment away from the United States.”
Notably, the two said the so-called diffusion rule issued by the Biden administration was “rightfully criticized for being overly complicated and burdensome.” The rule created a system of tiers for which countries could buy American AI chips, placing tougher restrictions on geopolitical adversaries, as well as some allies like Poland.
But despite the criticism, Warren and Rounds said the rule’s ultimate goal of keeping the AI infrastructure in the United States should be included in any new rulemaking.
The rule, blocked by the Trump administration, drew fierce criticism from the chips industry, which said it would have crippled global American leadership on AI and allowed Chinese tech firms to dominate the world market.
Export controls. The two also reinforced that export controls “play a key role” in keeping AI in America just as the administration relaxes curbs on chips going to China.
Warren is increasingly becoming one of the most prominent voices in the chips export control debate, often siding with GOP China hawks. As we’ve written, this is a policy area where the political lines are blurring.
While some lawmakers and administration officials, most prominently White House AI Czar David Sacks, say it is critical that U.S. chipmakers take as much global market share as possible, others want to be more restrictive of AI technology going abroad.
