Rogue AI fears spur calls for guardrails & new legislation

WASHINGTON (TNND) — Amid a contentious debate over how to rein in artificial intelligence, plenty of ideas exist, but no clear path forward.

With industry leaders speaking out, fear is spreading across the country regarding AI’s impact on humanity, with their calls to action being met with mixed reactions.

Speaking to reporters Monday, Vice President JD Vance said, "I don't think Americans should be scared of anything. I think that we have to be mindful that there are risks; there are downsides to anything, and that's certainly true of AI."

But in an interview with NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said, "You know what’s moving quickly? AI 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."

Fears of AI’s power follow recent incidents where AI essentially went rogue, now compounded by warnings from ceo’s of AI companies

OpenAI’s Sam Altman warned in a post on X, "We could lose control of the future to AI." He also called for more safety techniques and said there's another concern as well.

"We could end up in a world with too much concentration of power. If an extraordinarily powerful AI is used by one person or company to impress their worldview onto everyone else, the results could be extremely dystopian."

In an interview with CBS Sunday Morning, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said, "When something's very powerful, then of course it can be used well and it can also be used for ill."

He added, "I'm worried about misuse of AI models. Just uh two days ago, we put out a report about misuse of models to build biological weapons."

But Amodei insists if his company and others continue to "build in the right way", the probability of something bad happening is very low.

It's a sentiment echoed by President Donald Trump, who posted Monday that "The only control or “guardrails” that AI needs is a strong and smart (high iq!) President. " He also wrote, "There is a sick conspiracy going on against ai and data centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China."

On Sunday evening during a gaggle on Air Force One, he was asked about the dangerous posted by AI.

When asked what he used it for, Trump said. "I’m not gonna tell you."

Later Monday, Trump posted, "Concerning AI, when, in the History of Business, did anyone see the Leaders of an Industry call for Regulation that, if strongly implemented, will drive them into oblivion and bankruptcy? AI taking over the World, destroying Humanity, and all other things bad, is a HOAX."

The debate over AI’s power to ruin humanity has been amplified by another aspect of the AI race: data centers.

Popping up all over the country, the issue is scrambling political parties, including backlash from some of the President's biggest supporters.

In an August 17 interview on Fox News, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said,

"I pressed pause on any new data center approval in the state of Texas," Abbott spoke about new guidelines he put forth for existing data centers as well.

In New York, the issue is seeping into candidates' cases in a contentious race.

Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., is out with a new ad, trying to tie his opponent to data centers, suggesting she's raked in thousands of dollars from the industry.

"Cait Conley has hundreds of thousands of reasons why she wants to build data centers in the Hudson Valley, a voice says, then plays a soundbite from Conley herself saying, 'We need data centers.'"

But Conley insists it's Lawler who has been in office as data centers have been developed in their district.

In a September 6 interview on CNN, she said:

"On Mike Lawler’s watch, five data centers were built in his own county alone with three more on the way."

On Capitol Hill, the House is expected to vote on new data center legislation as soon as Tuesday.

Supporters of the bipartisan Ratepayer Protection Act say it would ensure the companies building these data centers are the ones who pay for the infrastructure, instead of passing those costs onto taxpayers.