Denver — This week, as U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) kicked off his Senate AI Insight Forum, Colorado U.S. Senator Michael Bennet called for a dedicated federal agency to oversee Big Tech companies and assert the public interest. On Wednesday, Bennet also urged Schumer to adopt a principles-based approach as the Senate considers writing legislation on artificial intelligence (AI).

At the Axios Pro Happy Hour with Ashley Gold, Bennet said:

“I think it’s really important for us, for the Senate to say to these folks, we have failed to have a negotiation with you on economics, on privacy, on data on behalf of the American people. And we intend to do that.” 

“I’m going to continue to have this discussion with people in Colorado and across the country because I think it really is important… I don’t think Congress will ever effectively legislate. I don’t think the White House will ever effectively legislate. 

“I think we need an agency that’s dedicated to these subjects, especially with AI, that has the expertise to be able to be engaged with my constituents, and also with Big Tech, to come to a set of rules of the road that over time, through sort of a common law regulatory approach makes sense for the sector today.” 

On Fox News’ Your World with Neil Cavuto, Bennet said:

“The American people have never been able to negotiate on economics, on privacy, on data with some of the richest people on planet Earth.

“I think the way of dealing with that is to create an agency like the FCC or like the FDA, both of which have earned the trust of the American people, and can move maybe not at light speed, but compared to Congress, could actually move in a thoughtful and considered way as we think about creating, frankly, a new common law to regulate these agencies and establish for the American people a leadership position the globe when it comes to setting standards.”

Watch the full interview HERE.

On NBC’s Meet the Press Now with Garrett Haake, Bennet said:

“We need to have a new agency to regulate Big Tech. I am the first member of Congress to introduce a bill calling for that, and it was kind of an amazing out-of-body experience to be there to hear Elon Musk saying we need an agency like that. 

“But I think the reason we need it is that Congress will never do a good job of this. Leaving this to the courts would be a huge mistake; and I think what we need to do is instead – as we have in the past in American history – set up a new agency with the expertise that can move nimbly enough to help us capture the benefits of this new technology while making sure that, in the case of AI, we’ve got guardrails in place so that people can’t go out and build nuclear weapons or create pathogens that could kill millions of people. That’s stuff we need to take seriously, that’s stuff that we need to avoid, and it’s why we’ve got to do this.”

Watch the full interview HERE.

On NewsNation’s The Hill, Bennet said:

“The American people want to have a frickin’ negotiation with these guys… We have not had a negotiation on data. We haven’t had a negotiation on privacy, we haven’t had a negotiation on our economics. And that’s even before you get to artificial intelligence. That’s just the social media companies themselves. 

“I was a former school superintendent. I spent an hour and a half on Friday with school psychologists in Denver. And I can tell you something: they couldn’t even get to their patients because they were spending an hour and a half talking about how their kids had been so negatively affected by social media, even before artificial intelligence.”

“I think a very good step would be to have an FCC, an agency like that, that is dedicated to social media and artificial intelligence.”

Watch the full interview HERE.

Background:

Bennet has pushed strongly for greater regulation of digital platforms. In May, Bennet reintroduced the Digital Platform Commission Act, first-of-its-kind legislation to create a dedicated federal agency to oversee large technology companies. In June, Bennet called on major technology companies to identify and label AI-generated content, and introduced the Global Technology Leadership Act to bolster the government’s ability to assess U.S. capacity in emerging technologies relative to other countries. Bennet earlier introduced the Oversee Emerging Technology Act and the ASSESS AI Act to ensure government use of AI complies with fundamental rights, and joined his colleagues to introduce the REAL Political Ads Act to require a disclaimer on political ads for federal campaigns that use content generated by AI.