Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez to Unveil AI Data Center Moratorium Act

Editor’s note: Senator Sanders recently sat down with leaders in generative AI to discuss its potential impact on the country as a whole as well as on individual states.  Some states have datacenters that have been causing complaints among residents as they appear to be using energy consumption methods that are potentially hazardous to the environment and toxic to nearby residents.  Senator Sanders also recently condemned the CDC’s updated childhood vaccination schedule, along with NYC’s Health Commissioner.  A bill was just introduced this legislative session in New York, and there are 12 states that have such legislation introduced.

Below is the original announcement: 

WASHINGTON — Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) on Wednesday will announce the Artificial Intelligence Data Center Moratorium Act to ensure that AI benefits workers, is safe and effective and does not harm communities or destroy the environment.

At a time when AI and robotics are transforming the world as we know it and affecting everything from our economy and well-being to our democracy, warfare and our kids’ education, this first-of-its-kind legislation would impose a moratorium on the construction of all new AI data centers until strong national safeguards are in place to protect workers, consumers and communities, defend privacy and civil rights and ensure these technologies do not harm our environment.

Livestream: Sanders’ social media.

 Sanders, Ocasio-Cortez Announce AI Data Center Moratorium Act

WASHINGTON — Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) announced the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Data Center Moratorium Act, legislation that would enact a reasonable pause to the development of AI to ensure the safety of humanity.

“AI and robotics are creating the most sweeping technological revolution in the history of humanity. The scale, scope and speed of that change is unprecedented. Congress is way behind where it should be in understanding the nature of this revolution and its impacts,” Sanders said. “Bottom line: We cannot sit back and allow a handful of billionaire Big Tech oligarchs to make decisions that will reshape our economy, our democracy and the future of humanity. We need serious public debate and democratic oversight over this enormously consequential issue. The time for action is now. We need a federal moratorium on AI data centers.”

“We have seen ICE partner with AI companies to surveil Americans, social media users employ AI bots to create sexually explicit deepfakes of women and children, and data center construction inflate electric bills in communities across the country. And all of this harm has occurred because of the absence of federal legislation to regulate AI,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “Congress has a moral obligation to stand with the American people and stop the expansion of these data centers until we have a framework to adequately address the existential harm AI poses to our society. We must choose humanity over profit.”

The legislation would slow down the development of AI to give democracy a chance to catch up. The AI Data Center Moratorium Act of 2026 would do that by instituting an immediate federal moratorium on AI data centers until strong national safeguards are in place to ensure that:

• AI is safe and effective — preventing executives in the AI industry from releasing harmful products into the world that threaten the health and well-being of working families, our privacy and civil rights and the future of humanity.
• The economic gains of AI and robotics will benefit workers, not just the wealthy owners of Big Tech.
• AI does not increase electricity or utility prices, harm communities or destroy the environment.

Additionally, this bill will stop a global race to see which country is the first to eliminate hundreds of millions of jobs, or the first to build an AI that destroys the planet. It accomplishes this by banning U.S. exports of AI computing infrastructure to countries that do not have safeguards in place to guarantee AI is safe and effective, workers are protected and AI does not harm the environment.

More than 100 local communities around the country have enacted moratoriums on data centers and 12 states are pushing forward with statewide moratorium proposals.

In 2023, more than 1,000 industry leaders and scientists, including Elon Musk, Yoshua Bengio and Stuart Russell, called for AI labs to “immediately pause for at least 6 months” and, if such a pause were not enacted, called on governments to “step in and institute a moratorium.” In December, Elon Musk, who leads xAI, said he had “a lot of AI nightmares” and would “certainly slow down AI and robotics” if he could. In January, Demis Hassabis, the head of Google’s Deepmind, said he would support an AI pause if he knew other countries and companies also paused development. In February, Dario Amodei, the head of Anthropic, said he was “absolutely in favor of trying” to slow down AI development if other countries also slowed down.

Read a section-by-section summary here.

Read the text of the bill here.

Banner Image; Artifical Intelligence. Image Credit – Andy Kelly

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