March 27, 2024
🎉 It's Wednesday, and today is the one-year anniversary of our launch! We're celebrating with a jam-packed newsletter about the AI executive order.
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1 big thing: AI EO poised to hit on Hill priorities


The Biden administration is headed toward AI executive order milestones that will inform some of the most pressing tech issues on Capitol Hill, Maria reports.
Why it matters: Federal AI regulation is mostly moving forward through executive-branch action.
Driving the news: Tomorrow marks 150 days since President Biden issued his sweeping AI executive order.
What's inside: We've analyzed the upcoming deadlines and broken them down into key issue areas of importance for Hill policymakers: workforce, equity, copyright and research.
Workforce: Lawmakers worry about AI's impact on their constituents' jobs and livelihoods, with Sen. Richard Blumenthal calling that his "biggest nightmare, in the long term."
- The EO addresses the impact of AI on American workers, how to attract foreign talent and how to boost tech talent within the government.
- That's done through studies, guidance on best practices and updates to the country's immigration system.
Equity: Concerns over AI exacerbating inequity are top of mind on the Hill.
- Lawmakers are parsing out how existing civil rights laws can be applied and what gaps need to be filled with new regulations.
- The EO instructs HUD and CFPB to examine how the Fair Housing Act, the Consumer Financial Protection Act and the Equal Credit Opportunity Act apply to the use of AI in real estate transactions.
- The EO also calls for creating best practices for recruiting law enforcement professionals with certain technical skills as data privacy concerns mount.
Copyright: Artists and content creators are grappling with their works and likenesses being used without permission, and lawmakers are wading into the debate.
- USPTO under the executive order has to recommend potential copyright actions to the president.
- The agency already has issued guidance on AI's role in inventorship.
Research: In the near term, the threat of deepfakes is keeping lawmakers on both sides of the aisle up at night as the 2024 elections kick into full gear.
- Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has singled out deepfakes in elections as a top priority, and several bills have been introduced to prohibit them or require disclosure.
- The EO instructs the Commerce Department to study how to prevent generative AI from being used to create non-consensual imagery of real individuals and CSAM, another big topic on the Hill.
- Getting more researchers to help develop AI so it's not controlled by a few big companies is another focus for some lawmakers, and the EO calls for new research institutes to be established by 2025.
2. What the AI EO could mean for government work
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
The AI executive order lays out a strict timeline over the next year for agencies to make big changes to their workplaces, Ashley reports.
Why it matters: How the federal government uses AI in everyday work will provide a model for the rest of the country.
Driving the news: Over the next year, agencies are tasked with hitting deadlines calling for new reports and best practices related to hiring, government acquisitions and more.
By tomorrow, OMB must issue guidance to agencies to "strengthen the effective and appropriate use of AI, advance AI innovation, and manage risks from AI in the Federal Government," per the EO.
- 60 days later, agencies must designate a Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer, together with AI governance boards.
By April 27, the AI and Technology Talent Task Force will send a report to the president on progress related to hiring and maintaining AI talent, with the OPM establishing guidance on the best ways to do so.
- The Pentagon will report to the president on what can be done to address gaps in AI talent for defense.
- DHS and DOD will "identify, develop, test, evaluate, and deploy AI capabilities, such as large-language models" to find and fix vulnerabilities in government software and networks.
By July 26, the Energy Department will have a plan for analyzing the "nuclear, nonproliferation, biological, chemical, critical infrastructure, and energy-security threats or hazards" posed by AI models.
- Under that same deadline, the Chief Data Officer Council will have guidelines for security reviews on misusing federal data.
By October 29, the attorney general will submit a report on the use of AI in the criminal justice system.
The bottom line: By the end of the year, we'll have a much clearer idea of how the government is using AI in hiring, federal work and risk management if all the deadlines are met.
✅ Thank you for reading Axios Pro Policy, and thanks to editors Mackenzie Weinger and David Nather and copy editor Steven Patrick.
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