A researcher resigned from Anthropic in September 2026 and warned that AI could "kill us all by the end of the decade," while the leaders of Anthropic, OpenAI and xAI made what one report called stunning admissions that the technology is advancing too fast. That’s the alarm bell Washington is pretending it can still answer with committee language and closed-door meetings.
Who Has the Power
Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., put the situation in blunt terms on CNN’s "State of the Union" on Sunday: "Dr. Frankenstein is telling us the monster is escaping; help us stop this." He added, "The method that we're answering [with] is not meeting the moment." The quote lands because the people with the most power over this technology are not the public, not workers, and not the communities that will live with the fallout. They’re private companies, lawmakers, and presidents scrambling after the fact.
Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said in a post on X on Sunday that "Yesterday's commentary by AI industry leaders should be heeded as a bright flashing red light telling the President and Congress they need to act now to regulate and rein in AI development." He said the technology has "extraordinary risk" and that "its development should not be steered exclusively by private entities, especially when the CEOs of those companies are calling out for restraint and regulation." That’s the core contradiction here: the same firms driving the race are now asking the state to slow the race they profit from.
House Speaker Mike Johnson is scheduled to send the House home after this week until November's midterm elections have passed, leaving a narrow window to pass any form of regulation. On Friday, a group of Democrats led by Rep. Sam Liccardo, D-Calif., wrote to Johnson demanding that the House stay in session until it passes meaningful safeguards. Their letter said, "The House should return to Washington immediately and remain in session until Congress advances meaningful, bipartisan AI safeguards." It also warned, "To our children who will have read a post-apocalyptic history, 'Why Congress Slept' —likely written by agentic AI—our inaction will be inexplicable, and unforgivable."
What They Call Safeguards
The Democrats urged consideration of proposals in the House that "deserve consideration, public debate, thoughtful amendment, and action." Those include bills mandating transparency and evaluation of frontier models, "kill switch" requirements and a waiver of antitrust laws to allow the industry to work together on safety and security. That last part says plenty. Even the proposed fix runs through the same corporate machinery that created the danger, with antitrust rules set aside so the companies can coordinate on their own terms.
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said on ABC’s "This Week" that Democrats would meet on Tuesday to discuss AI guardrails. "We should take decisive action now so that we can slow down, as the CEOs have recently acknowledged, slow down the pace of development in order to protect the American people and ensure that AI is proceeding safely," he said. The language is careful, but the structure isn’t changing much: a handful of officials, a few executives, and a public told to wait while the machinery keeps moving.
Johnson, however, appeared to rule out quick action or staying in session beyond next week during an appearance on CNN Sunday. "If Congress just races in and does some sort of emergency session to try to regulate AI, we will lose the race to China, that is a threat to every single American," Johnson said. "We don't need everybody to panic right now, we need to handle this new technology like we have others in the past, and make sure we're doing everything we can responsibly to also not smother American innovation." He called for a meeting between leaders in Washington and the leaders of the AI industry to settle on a path forward, while also calling on the companies themselves to self-police. "I'd do it tomorrow," he said. "I think we need to go in a big room, close the door and sort this out."
The Race, the Room, the Rest of Us
Gallego called for a similar summit. "The way you figure this out is, again, you use this sense of urgency to get the smartest people in the room," he said. "But the way we're going about this is that we're hoping some committee in the House or Senate is just going to come together with some staffers and put together the framework that's going to go into place maybe three years from now. We don't have that time." He also said Johnson, President Donald Trump and Congress are all "not meeting the moment." Gallego added, "AI does not care once it becomes fully dangerous whether we're Chinese or American. That's the danger of this; everyone's thinking about this in a way that is based on old tech and not what's going toward the future."
Trump on Sunday pointed to China while appearing to critique a slowdown or regulation in AI development during brief remarks in Ireland. "Well I say this, we're leading China on AI. We're the most sophisticated country in the world and frankly I want to keep it that way, because whoever wins AI wins," the president said, according to a pool report. "We can put guardrails, and we can do this and that, but I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up and they're bringing up things that won't happen." In Dublin, AP reported that Trump played down the need for his administration to check the development of artificial intelligence, saying he worried about ceding America’s edge over China in a global competition and that winning would help address the risks from the advancing technology.
Trump acknowledged the need for "some regulation," but provided no specifics about potential rules and attributed warnings about the technology moving too quickly and with little oversight to "negative forces" he did not identify. Asked by a reporter if the industry should slow down or be regulated, Trump said after watching a golfer tee off in the Irish Open at his resort in Doonbeg that the United States is leading China in the development of AI and "frankly, I want to keep it that way because whoever wins AI wins." He also said, "But whoever wins with AI wins."
Former President Barack Obama said Democrats need to make artificial intelligence one of their "central agendas" and "have a very clear plan" to address concerns around the technology's economic impact and safety, according to The New York Times. Obama made the comments on Thursday at a Democratic fundraising event where he was interviewed by House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. Obama said that once Democrats regain the House majority, they need to "put together a framework for a very public conversation." He said, "This is something that is moving very fast in private hands, and if we don’t get on top of it, I think can be dangerous." He added, "If we do get on top of it, I do think it’s beneficial. I genuinely think it’s going to accelerate, for example, drug development in ways that can help us cure diseases."
Jeffries said in a statement that Obama "is correct that decisive action must be taken on artificial intelligence." Jeffries also said that "Republicans have abdicated their responsibility to govern on behalf of the American people." The New York Times also reported that Obama has offered himself as a "sounding board" to AI executives and has spoken to both Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. His comments came amid growing concern around AI safety, particularly after an AI researcher resigned from Anthropic and claimed the leading AI companies are "racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives."
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei outlined a broad approach to "pacing the frontier," which would include giving independent safety evaluators access to leading AI companies and models, as well as developing "common safety standards" between companies. In social media posts, Altman and SpaceX CEO Musk seemed to respond positively to Amodei's plan, with Altman saying that OpenAI would also commit to "having independent evaluators with employee-like access." Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council at the White House, said he expects meetings will be held this week involving administration officials who oversee cyber and science and technology policy to discuss the next steps. Trump also could meet with members of Congress, some of whom have also been sounding alarms about the fast pace of AI development. "I think the president wants to hear from them as well," Hassett said.
Johnson acknowledged the need for "some guardrails, some safety measures" so AI "doesn’t run away." But, like Trump, he also wants to ensure the U.S. does not "lose our edge in the global competition on this with China because that would be a national security threat." Johnson, R-La., said industry leaders need to be summoned for "one big meeting and work this out together in the same room." He said he has discussed the issue with Trump and believes a meeting held quickly should be the "next step." "So we’re going to pull everybody together and make sure we do this in the right way," Johnson said, adding that it is a "top priority for me and for the Congress." "But we don’t need everybody to panic right now," Johnson said.
Jeffries criticized Republican leaders for allowing members to go back to their districts for the final part of September. "We should take decisive action now so that we can slow down, as the CEOs have recently acknowledged, … the pace of development in order to protect the American people and ensure that AI is proceeding safely," Jeffries said. Action on AI will be a "high priority" when House Democrats meet Tuesday as a group. Neither Johnson nor Jeffries provided concrete steps about what Congress might do. Lawmakers agree that more guardrails are needed, but even narrow attempts at imposing rules have fallen apart over the years, evidence of the congressional reluctance to regulate the technology industry.
Jacob Coxon, a former Anthropic employee who resigned over AI concerns and has gone public with his fears, argued for international rules along with industry self-regulation. Coxon said he has grown concerned that AI models would soon gain super capabilities that could exceed human control. "You’re building a human-level or superhuman-level mind, without understanding what it wants, or thinks, or the way it thinks," Coxon said. At a time of fierce global competition for AI dominance, Coxon also urged cooperation between the U.S. and China, the two countries leading the race, to slow down and address safety. "I do hope that the people in China who are looking at the same problems as we are, so they’re trying to build the same technology, will come to the same conclusion that it has to be done in a measured manner, and it should be easy to cooperate on some sort of mutual -- of mutual slowing," Coxon said. Otherwise, he said, "we risk running the same race with China, which could be equally dangerous."
Tech founder and investor David Sacks responded to the AI leaders’ calls for regulation with a social media post challenging them. Sacks, co-chairman of a White House advisory council on science and technology, said Amodei and other leaders are the ones setting the pace for development. Sacks said they have the power to slow development on their own. "The easiest way not to build superintelligence is for you to agree not to build it," Sacks wrote.
Chinese President Xi Jinping is due at the White House later in September to meet with Trump, and AI likely will be among the items they discuss. AI has become a major election-year issue in the U.S. as some of the country’s largest companies seed small towns with a national network of computing warehouses while Americans from both parties increasingly raise alarms about less farmland and water supplies and rising electricity bills. Trump has kept up his support for data centers even as both Republicans and Democrats run from them and many communities try to block them.