Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
The House Science Committee on Wednesday approved two bipartisan AI policy bills.
Why it matters: Lawmakers are gearing up for a busy lame duck, and this markup is a key step to try to move some AI legislation this Congress.
Driving the news: The committee favorably reported the AI Incident Reporting and Security Enhancement Act and the Department of Energy Artificial Intelligence Act to the House.
The AI incident reporting measure directs NIST to update the National Vulnerability Database and to work with DHS to support the voluntary reporting and tracking of AI-related security and safety incidents.
- Rep. Jay Obernolte, the bill's co-sponsor and the House AI working group chair: "We're going to fight to make sure that this bill gets some floor time later this year and hopefully gets signed into law."
The DOE AI legislation would update guidance for the agency's development of AI systems related to national security, energy-efficiency and R&D.
- The bill would authorize the FASST initiative that leverages the agencies' 17 national laboratories to try to build the world's powerful integrated scientific AI systems.
- It would also direct the DOE to establish partnerships with nonprofit groups and private companies to collaborate on AI.
Lawmakers also approved the National Windstorm Impact Reduction Program Reauthorization Act and the Small Modular Reactor Demonstration Act.
Flashback: The committee advanced nine other bipartisan AI bills earlier this month, including the CREATE AI Act to authorize the National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource.
The bottom line: Lawmakers across the aisle are concerned about the level of investment that foreign adversaries like China are pouring into AI.
- Add to that worries over how far behind certain areas of the U.S. government's AI capabilities lag industry, and there could be movement on some key pieces of AI legislation after the election.
