June 1: This week in AI federal policy
DC/ai Decoded: A weekly newsletter on developments in artificial intelligence, quantum, and data federal policy
This week decoded
Shaping the week in AI federal policy, Congress has begun considering who pays when AI disrupts the workforce. Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-OR) is reportedly exploring a wage-security program for workers displaced by AI, funded by a tax on tech companies. This idea is echoed in op-eds from Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX), both pushing versions of an AI tax to fund worker protections.
The House prepares a busy week of hearings spanning privacy law, AI in higher education, and cybersecurity risks from frontier models.
On the regulatory front, NIST announced it has rebranded its AI Safety Institute Consortium, signaling a shift in the administration’s approach to AI governance. OMB issued new cross-agency orders rescinding and replacing a Biden directive on cyber event data reporting and retention.
Read more below
Congress
Hearings
This week
On June 3, the House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Commerce, Manufacturing, and Trade holds a hearing on “Examining Legislation to Establish a Federal Comprehensive Privacy and Data Security Law.”
On June 3, the House Education and the Workforce Subcommittee on Higher Education and Workforce Development holds the seventh hearing in a series on artificial intelligence, entitled “Building an AI-Ready America: Higher Education in the Age of AI.”
On June 4, the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, Artificial Intelligence, and the Internet holds a hearing on “Medicines and IP: Balancing Innovation and Access.”
On June 4, the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection holds a hearing on “The AI Security Landscape: How Frontier Models, Agentic AI, and AI Coding Tools Are Reshaping Cybersecurity and Critical Infrastructure Resilience.”
Upcoming
On June 23, the Senate Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing titled “Examining Tech Industry Practices and the Implications for Users and Families: Is This Social Media’s Big Tobacco Moment?” to consider issues including AI safety.
Legislation
Sens. Rick Scott (R-FL) and Tom Cotton (R-AR) introduced the Blocking CCP Spy Tech Act to require national security officials to make a determination of whether the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) tech companies threaten our national security. (Press release)
Reps. Vern Buchanan (R-FL), Terri Sewell (D-AL) and Suzan DelBene (D-WA) introduced the Semiconductor Superiority Act to amend the Section 48D Advanced Manufacturing Investment Credit to explicitly include property and infrastructure for space-based semiconductor manufacturing. (Text)
Correspondence
Reps. Dwight Evans (D-PA) and Madeleine Dean (D-PA) sent a letter to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission requesting information on how the agency is overseeing the increased power demand from data centers and how the Trump administration’s decision to cancel 223 clean-energy projects could impact transmission planning and delivering electricity to consumers due to changes in energy supply. (Press release)
Sens. Martin Heinrich (D-NM) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Rep. Pat Harrigan (R-NC) sent a letter to Department of Defense (DoD) Chief Information Officer Kirsten A. Davies expressing concern about hostile foreign adversaries using commercial location data to target American servicemembers in an active war zone and calling for the DoD to prevent the collection and sale of servicemembers’ personal information, including phone location data. (Letter)
Publications and Events
Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) and Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) published an op-ed in Breitbart entitled, “America’s Cybersecurity Cannot Be an Easy Target for Communist China.” They say, “If we don’t beat China in cyberspace, any of the scenarios we mentioned earlier could come to pass. That’s why Congress must pass the Strengthening Cyber Resilience Against State-Sponsored Threats Act. This bill creates a joint task force led by the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) to detect, analyze, and respond to CCP-backed cyber threats like Volt Typhoon. It also mandates that CISA issues annual reports to Congress detailing threat assessments and recommendations to counter these threats.” (Op-ed)
Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) published an op-ed in the Daily State News entitled “Country’s economic policies need work,” saying, “Finally, I’ve heard from so many Delawareans about artificial intelligence. When the Chrysler and GM plants closed here — in 2008 and 2009, respectively — it caused a river of loss and anger. Toward the end of the last century, my predecessors in Congress were so focused on the gains from free trade — more affordable goods for every American — that they were blind to its costs in communities across our country. The rise of AI represents a similar turning point for our country. We cannot — we must not — make the same mistake again. AI has the potential to create incredible opportunity for Americans, but we can’t sacrifice your financial security in exchange for that potential. A just policy will ensure that the gains from AI innovation are shared by as many people as possible. It would strengthen our safety net, so it can catch anyone who does lose a job, and it would fund robust training opportunities for those who want to switch into a new field.” (Op-ed)
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) published an op-ed in TIME entitled “Why We Need to Tax AI,” saying “Taxing AI is one way we make sure the winnings from AI benefit all Americans, rather than channeling them only to the wealthy few. If millions of people lose their jobs to AI, we’ll need the funds to deliver universal health care so those workers are not bankrupted by a visit to the doctor. If AI transforms the future of work, we’ll need to invest in free education and apprenticeships and a new jobs guarantee so that all Americans have good-paying work. And while workers get back on their feet, we’ll need the revenue to bolster unemployment insurance to keep families afloat. The only way we can get there is by overhauling our tax code.” (Op-ed)
Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX) published an op-ed in The American Prospect entitled “Tax AI to Create Jobs,” in which he says, “Taxing AI directly ties the solution directly to the problem. If AI use grows quickly, driving layoffs alongside it, the revenue from an AI tax would go up too. Unlike traditional corporate taxes, an AI tax like the one I am proposing works even if employers fire workers before AI companies show a profit. This AI tax should target the companies that stand to make billions of dollars by laying people off. The tax should be levied on AI providers, not consumers, and it should charge a higher rate for AI used by big corporations rather than individual users.” (Op-ed)
Trump Administration
White House
The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) issued a memo to all agency heads entitled “Ensuring Effective and Efficient Agency Logging and Network Visibility to Defend Against Evolving Cyber Threats” rescinding and replacing a Biden directive on cyber event data reporting and retention. The new directive takes a “a risk-based, prioritized logging approach.” Additional guidance from CISA will be forthcoming. (Memo)
National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)
NIST announced the retitling of the Artificial Intelligence Safety Institute Consortium (AISIC) to the NIST Artificial Intelligence Consortium, revising the scope of the Consortium’s research, and reissuing its invitation to organizations to submit letters of interest in order to collaborate with NIST, non-profit organizations, industry leaders, universities, and other agencies of the Federal Government “in addressing the challenges associated with the development and deployment of AI-based innovations.” Letters of interest from new organizations will be considered on an ongoing basis; the first period of review will begin within 60 days of the publication of the notice in the Federal Register. (Federal Register)
Commerce Department
On June 2, the Bureau of Industry and Security holds an open meeting of the Emerging Technology Technical Advisory Committee for public comments and/or industry presentations and a closed discussion of strategies and potential revisions to export control policies.
National Science Foundation (NSF)
The NSF published a notice that it has renewed the committee for Information and Intelligent Systems (Federal Register), the committee for Cyberinfrastructure (Federal Register), and other related committees.
Noteworthy Quotes and Events
ADMINISTRATION
Federal Reserve
Governor Lisa Cook delivered remarks at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research entitled “The Opportunities and Risks AI Presents for the Economy and Financial System,” concluding “The totality of our experience with AI leads us to the conclusion that, alongside experimentation, strong governance and risk management must be our foundation. The most promising approaches augment human judgment with AI capabilities while building verification into the architecture itself. The urgency is real. AI is advancing rapidly, and financial institutions are adopting these technologies apace. As policymakers, we must understand these systems through hands-on experience. By building our own AI capabilities, we gain invaluable insights into both the promise and risks these technologies bring to the financial system. With appropriate governance frameworks, autonomous intelligence can potentially expand our analytical capabilities. These tools could enhance our capacity to identify and respond to evolving threats. But we proceed with both optimism and caution, as warranted at this moment of a technological inflection point.” (Remarks)
CONGRESS
Memory Chip Shortage
Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH) said, “My point of view is that the American company should supply American producers before they start selling any of them overseas.” (Punchbowl)
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) said, “What we could do is expedite the electricity, expedite water projects.” (Punchbowl)
Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) said, “From a CHIPS standpoint, we expedite the process and from a regulatory standpoint, if there are things that need to be done to cut some of the red tape that is slowing this down.” (Punchbowl)
Obernolte-Trahan Bipartisan AI Partnership
Regarding her partnership with Obernolte on comprehensive AI regulation, Rep. Lori Trahan (D-MA) said, “I think it’s not a mystery what I’m fighting for in these conversations. Safety is paramount; our kids, our national security, innovation. … We think the moment requires it.” She added, “Suppose there is a catastrophic event or suppose there is a disruption to an employer where people are laid off because you weren’t at the table, we weren’t having these conversations. Like, how do I look folks back in the eye and say, ‘Oh yeah, we were just waiting until we had the gavels.’” (Politico)
Trahan also said, “I’ve been very happy to work with Jay. … I like the way the conversations are progressing, and, you know, I’m hopeful that we can share something soon….The stakes are too high for us to rush it and they’re too high for us to get it wrong.” (Politico)
On Trahan’s work with Obernolte, Rep. Ted Lieu (D-IL) said, “I know very little about what she and Obernotle are discussing. I have not been read in. We’re focused on building a framework for Leader Jeffries before the end of the year on what Democrats should focus on after we flip the House. But members can do whatever they want. I haven’t followed [Trahan] — I literally have no idea what language even looks like or if they’ve even talked about language.” (Politico)
Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said, “I haven’t talked to Lori Trahan about it.” (Politico)
Rep. Sam Liccardo (D-CA), who recently broke with Obernolte on federal preemption, said, “We’re all interested in trying to find a framework that makes sense. Jay is open-minded, but he has constraints on his side of the aisle, and it makes it very difficult to find openness.” (Politico)
Miscellaneous
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) posted “AI was trained on generations of human knowledge and work. Now Big Tech is making billions from it. It’s time to tax AI and make sure the American people benefit from what they helped build.”
Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX) posted “With AI, we’re in the middle of the greatest technological transformation of our lifetimes. My new plan: a tax on AI companies that funds new jobs — so the unemployment rate does not rise. Progress should benefit everyone, not just a few billionaires.”
Casar also posted “The government is doing nothing to stop AI from taking your job. Nothing to stop AI from exploiting your kid. Nothing to stop AI from giving advice to terrorists. Because AI companies are spending hundreds-of-millions through Super PACs. That has to change.”
On President Trump’s abrupt cancellation of his AI executive order, Rep. Jay Obernolte (R-CA) said, “I think it’s an indication that the White House is having as much trouble as the rest of us are in making sure that they achieve the right balance when it comes to AI regulation.” (Punchbowl)
On transparency requirements for AI companies, Obernolte said, “[It] gives a window for everyone to see what’s being done and how the risks are being controlled. I think that’s a good thing… Compliance with one person’s idea of what’s safe or not safe, maybe that’s something that gets more in the territory of being voluntary.” (Punchbowl)
Rep. Andy Ogles (R-TN) posted “AI can hack and destroy infrastructure just as fast as it can make animated fruit videos. I’m getting some folks together so we can defend against this.”
Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) posted “Dystopian: the Trump Administration wants to use smart glasses to invade your privacy, scan your face and biometrics without your knowledge, and threaten your civil rights. HELL NO! I’m fighting back—we need to protect our fundamental right to privacy.”
What I’m Reading This Week
What’s the Problem with Quantum Noise?, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
About Zero One Strategies
Zero One Strategies is a specialized government relations practice dedicated to navigating the complex landscape of U.S. federal policy in emerging technologies. As advancements in technology continue to outpace regulatory frameworks, Zero One Strategies aims to provide strategic guidance and bipartisan advocacy for innovators and businesses operating at the forefront of technological development.
The practice focuses on key areas such as artificial intelligence, digital assets, blockchain, decentralized technologies, cybersecurity, data, and digital infrastructure, as well as the multiple policy issues impacting these sectors, including tax and financial services.
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