Rounds: AI provides endless opportunities for medical research

May 16, 2024

22 20 minutes read

Untitled design6 — driving us senate innovation in artificial intelligence policy logo from news release 051624.png

MAY 16, 2024:

The Bipartisan Senate AI Working Group comprised of Senator Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) and Senator Todd Young (R-Ind.) released (May 16, 2024) a roadmap for artificial intelligence policy in the United States Senate.

Aafter months of discussion, hundreds of stakeholder meetings, and nine first-of-their-kind, all-Senator AI Insight Forums, the Bipartisan Senate AI Working Group comprised of Senator Mike Rounds (R-S.D.), Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) and Senator Todd Young (R-Ind.) released an AI policy roadmap that summarizes their findings and lays out policy topics that the group believes merit bipartisan committee consideration in the 118th Congress and beyond.

“Artificial intelligence is already changing our world as we know it,” said Rounds. “After hosting nine AI Insight Forums to educate ourselves and our colleagues, we have created a first-of-its-kind AI roadmap highlighting specific topics we believe Congress should address. This roadmap to the future of AI sets the stage as we seek to harness its power to bring greater prosperity to the American people while also mitigating potential long-term risks. I look forward to seeing how my colleagues use their policy expertise in each committee to address these issues through regular order. We have a real opportunity to shape its future, and we need to embrace this challenge with open arms.”

“No technology offers more promise to our modern world than artificial intelligence. But AI also presents a host of new policy challenges. Harnessing the potential of AI demands an all-hands-on-deck approach and that’s exactly what our bipartisan AI working group has been leading,” said Schumer. “After talking to advocates, critics, academics, labor groups, civil rights leaders, stakeholders, developers, and more, our working group was able to identify key areas of policy that have bipartisan consensus. Now, the work continues with our Committees, Chairmen, and Ranking Members to develop and advance legislation with urgency and humility.”

“In the midst of rapid AI advancements, the Senate can lead or be led. We plan to lead, to deliver for the American people, helping ensure that AI comes as a benefit to society, not a threat,” said Heinrich. “This roadmap positions us to unlock AI innovation that will deliver major scientific and medical advancements and help maintain our global leadership. Most importantly, the roadmap lays out the guardrails necessary to mitigate the risks of AI — from blocking corporations from trying to use American’s data against them, to safeguarding the work of creative professionals and protecting workers’ jobs by preventing the automation of tasks that only should be done by humans. Now it’s time for the Senate to act on these recommendations.”

“The rapid pace of AI innovation brought this bipartisan working group together to consider how policymakers can ensure the incredible and promising aspects of AI are able to flourish while guarding against its risks,” said Young. “This roadmap represents the most comprehensive and impactful bipartisan recommendations on artificial intelligence ever issued by the legislative branch. Our goal is to ensure the United States maintains its leadership in AI innovation, enabling the American people to reap the substantial national security, economic, and societal benefits of an AI-driven future.”

This AI policy roadmap summarizes the findings of the bipartisan working group and highlights policy topics that the group believes merit bipartisan consideration in the Senate in the 118th Congress and beyond. Ultimately, it is the hope of this group that this roadmap helps to inform consideration of bipartisan AI legislation that maintains U.S. leadership on innovation, promotes safety and accountability in AI and makes certain all Americans benefit from the opportunities created by AI.

A one-pager detailing the roadmap can be found here.

The AI policy roadmap for the 118th Congress can be found here.

MAY 15, 2024:

WASHINGTON (AP) — A bipartisan group of four senators led by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is recommending that Congress spend at least $32 billion over the next three years to develop artificial intelligence and place safeguards around it, writing in a report released Wednesday that the U.S. needs to “harness the opportunities and address the risks” of the quickly developing technology.

The group of two Democrats and two Republicans said in an interview Tuesday that while they sometimes disagreed on the best paths forward, they felt it was imperative to find consensus with the technology taking off and other countries like China investing heavily in its development. They settled on a raft of broad policy recommendations that were included in their 33-page report.

While any legislation related to AI will be difficult to pass, especially in an election year and in a divided Congress, the senators said that regulation and incentives for innovation are urgently needed.

“It’s complicated, it’s difficult, but we can’t afford to put our head in the sand,” said Schumer, D-N.Y., who convened the group last year after AI chatbot ChatGPT entered the marketplace and showed that it could in many ways mimic human behavior.

The group recommends in the report that Congress draft emergency spending legislation to boost U.S. investments in artificial intelligence, including new research and development and new testing standards to try to understand the potential harms of the technology. The group also recommended new requirements for transparency as artificial intelligence products are rolled out and that studies be conducted into the potential impact of AI on jobs and the U.S. workforce.

Republican Sen. Mike Rounds, a member of the group, said the money would be well spent not only to compete with other countries who are racing into the AI space but also to improve Americans’ quality of life — supporting technology that could help cure some cancers or chronic illnesses, he said, or improvements in weapons systems could help the country avoid a war.

“This is a time in which the dollars we put into this particular investment will pay dividends for the taxpayers of this country long term,” he said.

The group came together a year ago after Schumer made the issue a priority — an unusual posture for a majority leader — and brought in Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico, Republican Sen. Todd Young of Indiana and Rounds of South Dakota.

As the four senators began meeting with tech executives and experts, Schumer said in a speech over the summer that the rapid growth of artificial intelligence tools was a “moment of revolution” and that the government must act quickly to regulate companies that are developing it.

Young said the development of ChatGPT, along with other similar models, made them realize that “we’re going to have to figure out collectively as an institution” how to deal with the technology.

“In the same breath that people marveled at the possibilities of just that one generative AI platform, they began to hypothesize about future risks that might be associated with future developments of artificial intelligence,” Young said.

While passing legislation will be tough, the group’s recommendations lay out the first comprehensive road map on an issue that is complex and has little precedent for consideration in Congress. The group spent almost a year compiling the list of policy suggestions after talking privately and publicly to a range of technology companies and other stakeholders, including in eight forums to which the entire Senate was invited.

The first forum in September included X owner and Tesla CEO Elon Musk, Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg, former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates and Google CEO Sundar Pichai.

Schumer said after the private meeting that he had asked everyone in the room — including almost two dozen tech executives, advocates and skeptics — whether government should have a role in the oversight of artificial intelligence, and “every single person raised their hand.”

Still, there are diverse views in the tech industry about the future of AI. Musk has voiced dire concerns evoking popular science fiction about the possibility of humanity losing control to advanced AI systems if the right safeguards are not in place. Others are more concerned about the details of how proposed regulations could affect their business, from possible government oversight over the most capable AI systems to tracking of highly sought-after AI computer chips for national security.

The four senators are pitching their recommendations to Senate committees, which are then tasked with reviewing them and trying to figure out what is possible. The Senate Rules Committee is already moving forward with legislation, on Wednesday approving three bills that would ban deceptive AI content used to influence federal elections, require AI disclaimers on political ads and create voluntary guidelines for state election offices that oversee candidates.

Schumer, who controls the Senate’s schedule, said those election bills were among the chamber’s “highest priorities” this year. He also said he planned to sit down with House Speaker Mike Johnson, who has expressed interest in looking at AI policy but has not said how he would do that.

Still, winning enough votes on the legislation may be not be easy. The bills that would ban deceptive AI election content and require AI disclaimers on political ads were approved by the Rules panel on party line votes, with no GOP support. Republicans argued that the legislation would usurp states that are already acting on the issue and potentially violate political candidates’ rights to free speech.

Senate Rules Committee Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota, said that the rapid development of AI is a “hair on fire” moment for elections. And while states may be passing similar bills, she said the country is “unguarded on the federal level.”

Some experts warn that the U.S. is behind many other countries on the issue, including the EU which took the lead in March when they gave final approval to a sweeping new law governing artificial intelligence in the 27-nation bloc. Europe’s AI Act sets tighter rules for the AI products and services deemed to pose the highest risks, such as in medicine, critical infrastructure or policing. But it also includes provisions regulating the new class of generative AI systems like ChatGPT that have rapidly advanced in recent years.

“It’s time for Congress to act,” said Alexandra Reeve Givens, CEO of the Center for Democracy & Technology. “It’s not enough to focus on investment and innovation. We need guardrails to ensure the responsible development of AI.”

Others said the senators’ road map wasn’t tough enough on tech companies. Some groups calling for tighter AI safeguards and civil rights protections said it showed too much deference to industry priorities.

Alix Dunn is a senior adviser at AI Now, a policy research center that pushes for more accountability around AI technology. She criticized the closed door sessions with tech CEOs. “I don’t see how it got us even an inch closer to meaningful government action on AI,” she said.

The senators emphasized balance between innovation and safeguards, and also the urgency of action.

“We have the lead at this moment in time on this issue, and it will define the relationship between the United States and our allies and other competing powers in the world for a long time to come,” Heinrich said.

OCTOBER 30, 2023:

South Dakota US Senator Mike Rounds and the bipartisan Artificial Intelligence working group hosted a panel discussion earlier this month (Oct. 19, 2023) with a group of medical professionals focused on the applications for artificial intelligence in medical research.

Rounds says the panel participants agreed collaboration and regulation are both needed.

Rounds says incredible progress can be made when all groups work together.

Rounds says the databases that AI uses to find information to make its decisions are one of three things we have to have in order to create a successful AI program.

He says the third thing that’s needed is the most sensitive piece.

Incidentally, United States President Joe Biden will sign an executive order today (Oct. 30, 2023) to guide the development of artificial intelligence. The order will reflect the government’s effort to shape how AI evolves in a way that can maximize its possibilities and while also containing its perils.

In addition to Rounds, the AI working group is comprised of fellow republican Senator Todd Young of Indiana and democrats Majority Leader Chuck Schumer from New York and Senator Martin Heinrich from New Mexico.

OCTOBER 26, 2023:

South Dakota US Senator Mike Rounds and the bipartisan Artificial Intelligence working group hosted a panel discussion last week (Oct. 19, 2023) focused on the use of AI in cancer research.

The panel, comprised of academic and industry experts, discussed how AI is transforming health care.

Rounds, who lost his wife Jean to cancer nearly two years ago (Nov. 2, 2021), says advances are being made that can make a difference on an individual basis.

He says Artificial Intelligence has the capability to take human response time in treating a disease from years, down to seconds.

And, Rounds says, the next five years will bring incredible advances in the use of AI.

In addition to Rounds, the AI working group is comprised of fellow republican Senator Todd Young (R-Ind.) and democrats Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.).

Guest speakers during the panel discussion were:

Dr. Ned Sharpless, with the University of North Carolina School of Medicine;
Dr. Michael Howell, with Google;
Dr. Eli Van Allen, with Harvard Medical School;
Rick Stevens, with Argonne National Lab; and
Lauren Silvis, with Tempus.

SEPTEMBER 13, 2023, UPDATE:

Extended version:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has been talking for months about accomplishing a potentially impossible task: passing bipartisan legislation within the next year that encourages the rapid development of artificial intelligence and mitigates its biggest risks.

On Wednesday (Sept. 13, 2023), he convened a meeting of some of the country’s most prominent technology executives, among others, to ask them how Congress should do it.

The closed-door forum on Capitol Hill included almost two dozen tech executives, tech advocates, civil rights groups and labor leaders. The guest list featured some of the industry’s biggest names: Meta’s Mark Zuckerberg and X and Tesla’s Elon Musk as well as former Microsoft CEO Bill Gates. All 100 senators were invited; the public was not.

“Today, we begin an enormous and complex and vital undertaking: building a foundation for bipartisan AI policy that Congress can pass,” Schumer said as he opened the meeting. His office released his introductory remarks.

Schumer, who was leading the forum with Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., will not necessarily take the tech executives’ advice as he works with colleagues to try and ensure some oversight of the burgeoning sector. But he is hoping they will give senators some realistic direction for meaningful regulation of the tech industry.

“It’s going to be a fascinating group because they have different points of view,” Schumer said in an interview with The Associated Press before the event. “Hopefully we can weave it into a little bit of some broad consensus.”

Tech leaders outlined their views, with each participant getting three minutes to speak on a topic of their choosing.

Musk and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt raised existential risks posed by AI, Zuckerberg brought up the question of closed vs. “open source” AI models and IBM CEO Arvind Krishna expressed opposition to the licensing approach favored by other companies, according to a person in attendance.

There appeared to be broad support for some kind of independent assessments of AI systems, according to this person, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the rules of the closed-door forum.

“It was a very civilized discussion among some of the smartest people in the world,” Musk said after leaving the meeting. He said there is clearly some strong consensus, noting that nearly everyone raised their hands after Schumer asked if they believed some regulation is needed.

Some senators were critical of the private meeting, arguing that tech executives should testify in public.

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said he would not attend what he said was a “giant cocktail party for big tech.” Hawley has introduced legislation with Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., to require tech companies to seek licenses for high-risk AI systems.

“I don’t know why we would invite all the biggest monopolists in the world to come and give Congress tips on how to help them make more money and then close it to the public,” Hawley said.

Congress has a lackluster track record when it comes to regulating technology, and the industry has grown mostly unchecked by government in the past several decades.

Many lawmakers point to the failure to pass any legislation surrounding social media. Bills have stalled in the House and Senate that would better protect children, regulate activity around elections and mandate stricter privacy standards, for example.

“We don’t want to do what we did with social media, which is let the techies figure it out, and we’ll fix it later,” Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Mark Warner, D-Va., said about the AI push.

Schumer said regulation of artificial intelligence will be “one of the most difficult issues we can ever take on,” and ticks off the reasons why: It’s technically complicated, it keeps changing and it “has such a wide, broad effect across the whole world,” he said.

But his bipartisan working group — Rounds and Sens. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., and Todd Young, R-Ind. — is hoping the rapid growth of artificial intelligence will create more urgency.

Rounds said ahead of the forum that Congress needs to get ahead of fast-moving AI by making sure it continues to develop “on the positive side” while also taking care of potential issues surrounding data transparency and privacy.

“AI is not going away, and it can do some really good things or it can be a real challenge,” Rounds said.

Sparked by the release of ChatGPT less than a year ago, businesses across many sectors have been clamoring to apply new generative AI tools that can compose human-like passages of text, program computer code and create novel images, audio and video. The hype over such tools has accelerated worries over its potential societal harms and prompted calls for more transparency in how the data behind the new products is collected and used.

“You have to have some government involvement for guardrails,” Schumer said. “If there are no guardrails, who knows what could happen.”

Some concrete proposals have already been introduced, including legislation by Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., that would require disclaimers for AI-generated election ads with deceptive imagery and sounds. Hawley and Blumenthal’s broader approach would create a government oversight authority with the power to audit certain AI systems for harms before granting a license.

In the United States, major tech companies have expressed support for AI regulations, though they don’t necessarily agree on what that means. Microsoft has endorsed the licensing approach, for instance, while IBM prefers rules that govern the deployment of specific risky uses of AI rather than the technology itself.

Similarly, many members of Congress agree that legislation is needed but there is little consensus. There is also division, with some members of Congress worrying more about overregulation while others are concerned more about the potential risks. Those differences often fall along party lines.

“I am involved in this process in large measure to ensure that we act, but we don’t act more boldly or over-broadly than the circumstances require,” Young said. “We should be skeptical of government, which is why I think it’s important that you got Republicans at the table.”

Some of Schumer’s most influential guests, including Musk and Sam Altman, CEO of ChatGPT-maker OpenAI, have signaled more dire concerns evoking popular science fiction about the possibility of humanity losing control to advanced AI systems if the right safeguards are not in place.

But for many lawmakers and the people they represent, AI’s effects on employment and navigating a flood of AI-generated misinformation are more immediate worries.

Rounds said he would like to see the empowerment of new medical technologies that could save lives and allow medical professionals to access more data. That topic is “very personal to me,” Rounds said, after his wife died of cancer two years ago.

Some Republicans have been wary of following the path of the European Union, which signed off in June on the world’s first set of comprehensive rules for artificial intelligence. The EU’s AI Act will govern any product or service that uses an AI system and classify them according to four levels of risk, from minimal to unacceptable.

A group of European corporations has called on EU leaders to rethink the rules, arguing that it could make it harder for companies in the 27-nation bloc to compete with rivals overseas in the use of generative AI.

“We’ve always said that we think that AI should get regulated,” said Dana Rao, general counsel and chief trust officer for software company Adobe. “We’ve talked to Europe about this for the last four years, helping them think through the AI Act they’re about to pass. There are high-risk use cases for AI that we think the government has a role to play in order to make sure they’re safe for the public and the consumer.”

SEPTEMBER 13, 2023:

South Dakota US Senator Mike Rounds and New York Senator and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer are moderating a closed door discussion with tech company leaders regarding how Congress should approach the opportunities and risks posed by artificial intelligence.

The discussion includes top tech leaders including Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg and Bill Gates. The bipartisan Artificial Intelligence working group is holding the all-day, closed door forum.

Rounds says Artificial Intelligence is changing the world as we know it. He says it is in the best interest of our country to fully harness the power of AI while mitigating risk. He says it’s important that lawmakers hear from those on the cutting edge of this technology so they can make better-informed public policy.

Rounds he would like to see the empowerment of new medical technologies that could save lives and allow medical professionals to access more data. He told the Associated Press prior to the gathering that the topic is “very personal to me,” after his wife Jean died of cancer two years ago.

In May 2023, the bipartisan AI working group was formed to pursue the opportunities and tackle the threats presented by AI. Over the past several months, the working group facilitated briefings to expand the Senate’s knowledge on AI. In addition to Rounds and Schumer, the working group is comprised of New Mexico Senator Martin Heinrich Indiana Senator Todd Young.

The tech company participants are:

Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI (developer of ChatGPT)
Rumman Chowdhury, CEO of Humane Intelligence
Jack Clark, Co-founder of Anthropic
Clément Delangue, Co-founder and CEO of Hugging Face
Eric Fanning, President and CEO of Aerospace Industries Association
Bill Gates, Former CEO of Microsoft and Co-chair of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Tristan Harris, Co-founder and ED of Center for Humane Technology
Jensen Huang, President and CEO of NVIDIA
Alex Karp, Co-founder and CEO of Palantir
Arvind Krishna, CEO of IBM
Janet Murguía, President of UnidosUS
Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and Chairman of X (formerly Twitter)
Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft
Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google
Deborah Raji, Researcher from University of California, Berkeley
Charles Rivkin, Chairman and CEO of Motion Picture Association
Eric Schmidt, Former CEO of Google and Chair of Special Competitive Studies Project
Elizabeth Shuler, President of AFL-CIO
Meredith Stiehm, President of Writers Guild of America West
Randi Weingarten, President of American Federation of Teachers
Maya Wiley, President and CEO of Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta (parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp)

Associated Press version:

On Wednesday (Sept. 13, 2023), he convened a meeting of some of the country’s most prominent technology executives, among others, to ask them how Congress should do it.

Schumer, D-N.Y., opened the session by saying that “today, we begin an enormous and complex and vital undertaking: building a foundation for bipartisan AI policy that Congress can pass.”

Rounds, who joined Schumer in the interview, said Congress needs to get ahead of fast-moving AI by making sure it continues to develop “on the positive side” while also taking care of potential issues surrounding data transparency and privacy.

“AI is not going away, and it can do some really good things or it can be a real challenge,” Rounds said.

Some concrete proposals are already being introduced, including a bill that would require disclaimers for AI-generated election ads with deceptive imagery and sounds. A broader approach would create a government oversight authority with the power to audit certain AI systems for harms before granting a license.

Congress has a lackluster track record when it comes to regulating technology. Lawmakers have lots of proposals but have mostly failed to agree on major legislation to regulate the industry. Powerful tech companies have resisted and some lawmakers are wary of overregulation.

Schumer’s bipartisan working group — Rounds and Sens. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., and Todd Young, R-Ind. — is hoping the rapid growth of artificial intelligence will create more urgency.

“You have to have some government involvement for guardrails,” Schumer said. “If there are no guardrails, who knows what could happen.”

While many members of Congress agree that legislation may be needed in response to the quick escalation of artificial intelligence, there is little consensus on what that should be, or what might be needed. There is also division, with some members of Congress worrying more about overregulation while others are concerned more about the potential risks of an unchecked industry. Those differences often fall along party lines.

Schumer said the forum’s focus is on big ideas such as whether the government should be involved at all and what questions Congress should be asking.

Participants were getting three minutes to speak on a topic of their choosing, with Schumer and Rounds moderating open discussions among the group.

But for many lawmakers and the people they represent, AI’s effects on employment and navigating a flood of AI-generated misinformation are more immediate worries. A recent report from market research group Forrester projected that generative AI technology could replace 2.4 million jobs in the U.S. by 2030, many of them white-collar roles not affected by previous waves of automation.

AI experts have also warned of the growing potential of AI-generated online disinformation to influence elections, including the upcoming 2024 presidential race.

Rounds said he would like to see the empowerment of new medical technologies that could save lives and allow medical professionals to access more data. That topic is “very personal to me,” Rounds said, after his wife died of cancer two years ago.

In the United States, major tech companies have expressed support for AI regulations, though they don’t necessarily agree on what that means.

Adobe, which makes Photoshop and the new AI image-generator Firefly, is proposing its own federal legislation: an “anti-impersonation” bill to protect artists as well as AI developers from the misuse of generative AI tools to produce derivative works without a creator’s consent.

Senators say they will figure out a way to regulate the industry, despite the odds.

“Make no mistake. There will be regulation. The only question is how soon, and what,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn, who has worked on his own AI bill.

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May 16, 2024

22 20 minutes read