{"id":848233,"date":"2026-09-15T04:24:13","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T04:24:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/848233\/"},"modified":"2026-09-15T04:24:13","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T04:24:13","slug":"barack-obama-kamala-harris-call-for-government-action-on-ai-development","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/848233\/","title":{"rendered":"Barack Obama, Kamala Harris call for government action on AI development"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n Former President Barack Obama<\/a> and former Vice President Kamala Harris <\/a>on Monday were among the latest high-profile Democrats to call for greater government action to address artificial intelligence as some industry leaders call for a slowdown in the technology\u2019s development amid growing public concern.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cWe need government \u2013 and specifically our leaders in Washington \u2013 to get proactive in coming up with concrete proposals, laws and regulations that deal with serious safety concerns, anticipate AI\u2019s impact on jobs and our kids, and make sure that AI\u2019s benefits are widely spread,\u201d Obama said in a statement <\/a>Monday night. \u201cGiven what we know about technology, we can\u2019t stuff AI back in a box. But we can collectively determine how it\u2019s developed and how it\u2019s used, rather than sitting back and letting AI and its fallout happen to us.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n The debate around artificial intelligence has ramped up in recent days, with some politicians and tech executives calling for greater government regulation of the industry while President Donald Trump has deemed the concerns <\/a>about AI a \u201cHOAX\u201d and part of a \u201cSICK conspiracy.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n In a sign of the issue\u2019s political potency, Obama, speaking at a private fundraiser alongside House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, last week urged Democrats, including those considering running for president in 2028, to put AI at the center of their agendas.\n <\/p>\n

\n Harris, who is seen as a possible 2028 contender after falling short of winning the presidency in 2024, chimed in on Monday with support for a slowdown to allow regulation to catch up with the technology.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe frontier of artificial intelligence is advancing at an alarming speed. Over the weekend, industry leaders voiced support for an idea that the American people and many AI researchers in their own labs have been calling for: We must responsibly slow the pace of frontier AI development,\u201d she said on X<\/a>. \u201cA slowdown is critical in order to ensure AI serves the public interest.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Harris called for Congress to establish a federal oversight agency and urged Trump, her former rival, to work towards an international treaty to address AI.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe United States must continue to lead the world in developing AI technology even as we seek to impose common-sense safety standards,\u201d she said. \u201cThis means that the president must do his job to protect America\u2019s interests by pursuing a treaty with countries like China to stop dangerous uses of AI, limit the speed of its development, and adopt global standards for testing.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Trump, however, has fiercely rejected calls for a slowdown or increased regulation in a series of social media posts in recent days downplaying safety concerns and hyping up the need to stay competitive with China.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cThe only control or \u2018guardrails\u2019 that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!\u201d Trump said on Monday. \u201cWe already have tremendous CRIMINAL and REGULATORY power over these companies! There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Trump\u2019s stance appears to be at odds with the growing public concerns about AI\u2019s development. Over the weekend, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei penned a lengthy essay<\/a> calling for a slowdown in the development of artificial intelligence. In an exclusive interview<\/a> with CNN\u2019s Anderson Cooper on Saturday, Amodei called on industry leaders to work together to avoid \u201cthe wrong paths\u201d and the possibility of AI harming humanity.\n <\/p>\n

\n Both Obama and Harris acknowledged the immense potential of the technology on Monday but underscored the need to pace development.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cI\u2019m not an AI accelerationist who believes it will lead to some techno-utopia, and I\u2019m not a doomer who thinks it will inevitably lead to humanity\u2019s destruction,\u201d the former president said. \u201cBut whether this technology results in amazing breakthroughs in medicine, energy and education or unleashes huge economic disruptions, greater inequality, and potential catastrophe will depend on the choices that we make right now \u2013 choices that should be made not just by the companies involved, but by all of us.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n Pete Buttigieg, a former Transportation secretary whose name is also in the mix for 2028, has also emphasized the stakes of the technology and over the weekend argued that the government need to address AI \u201chead on.\u201d\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201cAI is moving quickly. And for Congress to just sit on its hands, for the White House to do nothing real is something that is deeply dangerous to the American people and the world,\u201d Buttigieg said on NBC\u2019s \u201cMeet the Press\u201d on Sunday. \u201cThere need to be safeguards. There need to be rules. There need to be limits. There needs to be a kill switch on rogue AI. You can set up frameworks that can be adjusted and changed every 30 days.\u201d\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former President Barack Obama and former Vice President Kamala Harris on Monday were among the latest high-profile Democrats…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":848234,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[45],"tags":[182,181,507,74],"class_list":["post-848233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=848233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/848233\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/848234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=848233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=848233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=848233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}