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Congressional Daily Record
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March 24, 2026
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Download official Senate Record PDFReturn to issue contextMr. SANDERS. Mr. President, we are at the beginning of the most profound technological revolution in world history, a revolution which will bring unimaginable changes to every aspect of our society.
political lives, our privacy, our emotional well-being, our environment, and even our survival—the survival of humanity on this planet.
The scale, scope, and speed of this change will be unprecedented. That is not the view of Bernie Sanders. That is the view of some of the most knowledgeable people in the world who have developed AI, who study AI.
of Google's DeepMind—the AI revolution will be 10 times bigger than the industrial revolution and 10 times faster. In other words, the AI revolution will have 100 times the impact that the industrial revolution had.
People left the farms. They went to work in factories. People left factories. They went to work in offices. According to the head of Google's DeepMind,
this revolution will be 100 times more impactful.
Mr. President, it is not just what the leaders of the AI companies are saying. Take a look at what they are doing. This year, four—four— AI companies are spending almost $700 billion to build out data centers across this country. As a percentage of GDP, that is 10 times greater than what we spent each year on Moon landings, going to the Moon.
which it is progressing, AI has gotten far too little discussion here in Congress. I fear very much that while the American people are deeply concerned about the economic, the spiritual, the political impact of AI, Congress is totally unprepared to respond to the existential changes that are taking place. We are way, way, way behind where the American people are in terms of their concerns.
Question No. 1, a rather obvious question: Who is pushing the AI and robotics revolution? Ordinary people going up and saying: Hey, we got to automate factories. We got to do that. Who is pushing it? Well, I think we all know what the answer is. The answer is Mr. Musk, Mr. Bezos, Mr. Zuckerberg, Mr. Ellison.
Why are they doing it? Why are these multibillionaires investing huge sums of money into these new technologies? Do you think it is because they are staying up nights and they are saying: My goodness, 60 percent of the American people are struggling economically? They are living paycheck to paycheck. Can't afford groceries. They can't afford housing. They can't afford healthcare. And that is why we are going to push these technologies, to improve life for ordinary Americans.
Well, maybe, but I doubt that very much. I think the answer is obvious. These multibillionaires are investing in AI and robotics because those investments will increase their wealth and power exponentially. They will make massive profits. In other words, the richest and most powerful people on Earth will become even richer and more powerful.
And another question I think that we obviously should be asking is: What will the impacts of AI and robotics be on our society? How is it going to impact us? Pretty obvious question.
extensively, including Nobel Prize winners, AI and robotics will bring about the most rapid societal transformation in human history. Let me repeat. AI and robotics will bring about the most rapid societal transformation in human history.
massive job displacement. It will impact our emotional well-being and how we relate to each other as human beings. It will lead to a massive invasion of privacy. It will threaten our democratic institutions, and it will bring severe harm to our environment.
what was once seen as science fiction could soon become a reality, and that is superintelligent AI could become smarter than humans, could become independent of human control, and pose an existential threat to the human race. In other words, this is what they used to make science fiction movies about.
who have helped develop this technology, actually believe human beings could lose control over the planet to artificial intelligence.
Question No. 4: What happens to working people, to ordinary Americans during this revolutionary upheaval? Well, don't take my word for it. I am not an expert on it. Let's hear what the leaders in the industry are saying in their own words, not Bernie Sanders. This is what the people who have invested hundreds of billions of dollars in the industry are saying.
AI and robots will replace all jobs.
Now, is Mr. Musk exaggerating? Is he wrong? I don't know. But I think you might want to take a listen to one of the most powerful people on Earth, who is investing very heavily in these technologies.
[H]umans won't be needed for most things.
[W]ill be fully automated by an AI within the next 12 to 18
months.
fourth richest man alive, who is worth over $200 billion, is seeking to raise $100 billion to purchase factories all over America. OK? One of the richest guys in the world is seeking to raise $100 billion to purchase factories all over the country.
His goal: Replace the millions of workers who are employed in these plants with robots. Maybe somebody here might be raising some concerns about the fact that we are on the beginning of the end of manufacturing jobs in the United States.
And for Mr. Bezos, this is not just an idle threat. According to The New York Times, Mr. Bezos plans to fully automate Amazon operations. He owns Amazon. He wants to fully automate Amazon operations, beginning by replacing at least 600,000 workers with robots.
So this is a guy who has a track record. That is what he is doing right now; and he wants to expand that vision all across the country, basically wipe out manufacturing jobs in America and get rid of millions of workers.
Why does he want to do it? Well, the answer is fairly obvious: Because AI and robots will cost employers far less than human labor. Robots work 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Robots do not need sick days or healthcare. They don't take Christmas or New Year's Day off. They will end up costing employers a fraction of what human labor costs.
As Dario Amodei, the head of Anthropic, has said: AI isn't a substitute for specific human jobs but rather a general labor substitute for humans.
[H]ighly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most
economically valuable work.
which can do virtually any job better than a human being can do. What are the impacts of that? Well, you know, we might want to have a discussion about that here in the Congress.
As the ranking member of the U.S. Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, I released a number of months ago a well-researched report, finding that AI automation and robotics could replace nearly 100 million jobs in America over the next decade—100 million jobs— including 47 percent of truck drivers, 64 percent of accountants, and 89 percent of fast-food workers, among many other occupations.
driverless vehicles. In Texas now, you have 18-wheelers going down the road, and nobody is driving those trucks. And everything being equal, that will be the future unless we begin to start talking about it and figure out how we make AI robotics work for workers, not just the richest people on Earth.
starting to see the impact of AI on the working class in this country. Researchers at Stanford released a paper in November called “Canaries in the Coal Mine? Six Facts about the Recent Employment Effects of Artificial Intelligence” that found that there has already been a 16- percent relative decline in employment for younger workers in jobs exposed to AI like computer programming and customer service. Further, 42 percent of new college graduates are underemployed.
average, 242 job applicants. In other words, for our
young people, getting a job is going to be increasingly difficult.
If OpenAI is successful in building what they want to build—“highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work”—I have a very simple question that we might be discussing here on the floor of the Senate: What happens to those workers? How will they be able to find new jobs if there are no jobs to find? How are they going to feed their families? How are they going to buy healthcare? How are they going to stay alive if AI robotics eliminate millions of jobs and create massive unemployment? How will people survive if they have no income?
if workers are not paying taxes? If you don't work, you don't pay taxes.
Another question that we must be discussing: What impact will AI have on our ability to relate to each other as human beings? What impact will it have on our emotional well-being?
Well, work is one of the ways we connect to each other. In many cases, work also gives our lives meaning and purpose. We all, whether we are doctors or janitors, scientists or snowplow operators, want to serve our communities and be productive members of society. We want to give back. What happens when millions of people lose their jobs, their meaning and purpose, and their source of connection to each other?
I am also concerned—and it is not just me; parents all over this country are deeply concerned—about the impact AI is having on the emotional well-being of our kids and, in fact, of all people.
American teenagers say they have used AI for companionship, and more than half do so regularly.
So let's take a deep breath and ask ourselves a simple question: What does it mean for our young people to form friendships and become emotionally dependent on AI while at the same time becoming increasingly isolated from other human beings?
have been good and healthy for children's mental health and cognitive capabilities? I suspect most people understand that is not the case.
The statistics are quite clear. Mental health among young people is in crisis. According to the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, one in five young people has a diagnosed mental health condition such as anxiety or depression. From 2016 to 2023, the prevalence of anxiety has increased by over 60 percent.
cognitive decline in young people in our country and, in fact, in countries all over the world. In America today, more students are reading below a basic level than 20 years ago. It appears that the more time kids spend on screens, the worse it is for their brains.
companies that have gotten our kids hooked on screens and social media with even more power over our children's well-being and development? That is a question we need to be discussing long and hard.
Here is another question that I think we should be asking: Will AI result in a massive invasion of our privacy and our civil liberties?
information—what we search for online, where we visit, who we talk to, what we purchase. Now AI makes it possible for someone to quickly analyze all of that disparate information, find patterns, and create profiles of us.
investor in AI—predicts an AI-powered surveillance state is coming wherein “citizens will be on their best behavior because we are constantly recording and reporting everything that is going on.”
Last week, in my office, I had an extremely interesting experience. I spoke with Anthropic's AI Claude about the privacy risks posed by AI.
Here is what Claude told me:
When companies and governments have detailed profiles of
millions of people, they have power over those people in ways
most Americans don't fully grasp. They can manipulate your
choices, predict your behavior, and influence your thinking.
That is from Claude. I don't know if you are supposed to quote AI, but that is what AI said.
call, every email, every text, and every bank and medical record could be analyzed in a matter of minutes. Do we trust companies that have made billions of dollars in selling our information with this extraordinary power to instantly know everything about us?
Here is another question that needs to be seriously discussed: What impact will AI have on our democracy? We are already facing enormous threats from a corrupt campaign finance system, et cetera. What impact will AI have on our democracy?
officials and candidates may be totally false. In other words, words can be put into the mouths of individuals in a way that it is virtually impossible to detect.
Let me give you one rather personal example. Here is an image of a guy named Bernie Sanders, a Senator from Vermont. In this image or on this video, Senator Bernie Sanders is promoting a website that provides a government rebate. There is just one problem: I never said the words that they have coming out of my mouth. There is no government rebate. This whole thing is a total scam. Well, I must say the picture is not all that bad. But this is something we are going to see more and more of.
This is obviously not something just known to me; the so-called deepfakes have been created of many well-known people. Sometimes you are seeing people whom you know who say things that sound a little weird. Why are they saying that? Well, do you know what? They are not saying that. It is a fake.
candidate gets up there and says all of these wild and crazy things and you say “Wow. Why is that guy saying that?” Well, do you know what? He or she may not be saying that. It may be a total fake.
which is the distortion of truth, is increasingly being blurred. We are seeing that every day on the internet.
will, in fact, happen to our democratic institutions? It is an issue I think we need to be thinking about.
Further, what impact is AI having on our environment?
AI requires zillions of calculations. Those calculations require huge data centers, which, in turn, require a massive amount of electricity and water. For example, Meta is building a data center in Louisiana that is the size of Manhattan that will use as much electricity as 1.6 million homes. One data center will use as much electricity as 1.6 million homes.
rates. Over the past 5 years, wholesale electricity costs have increased by up to 267 percent in areas near data centers. Further, this increased demand will drive a massive expansion of fossil fuels when we are already seeing the devastating impacts of the global crisis of climate change.
This guy is named Dr. Geoffrey Hinton. He is considered by most people to be the godfather of AI. He did the groundbreaking work which led us to where we are today. He received a Nobel Prize in Physics a few years ago. What Dr. Hinton says is that there is a 10- to 20- percent chance they wipe us out.
that AI will become smarter than humans. It is not a question of whether that will happen; it is a question of when that will happen. AI has already developed concerning patterns. AI, today, can lie, it can cheat, and it can blackmail. In
other words, we already are beginning to lose control of AI.
What happens when AI becomes smarter than we are? This concern about superintelligence is why leading experts like the godfather of AI, Dr. Geoffrey Hinton, have warned there is a real chance that AI could wipe out humanity. I don't want to get people too nervous, but that is what some people are saying.
It is not just Hinton; there are a number of leading people. I was in California last month, talking to a number of people in the industry. The idea that humans can lose control of AI and that AI can act independently and cause extraordinary damage to the human race is not just science fiction; it is what many of these guys believe.
That leads to my final set of questions: Where is the Congress?
are of enormous consequence to every man, woman, and child in this country. And this is not new news. Poll after poll shows the American people are deeply concerned about the economic impacts on their kids, the existential threats, et cetera.
So where is Congress? What exactly have the House and the Senate done so far to address the extraordinary challenges posed by artificial intelligence?
The answer: Not much.
Well, why has Congress been totally ineffective on this issue?
The answer will not surprise the American people: We have a corrupt campaign finance system, and too often, Members of Congress are worried about their campaign contributions rather than the needs of their constituents.
running enormously profitable and well-funded companies, have already spent over $150 million buying influence, $150 million telling Congress: Leave us alone. We got it. Don't get involved in these issues. We will determine—we, the wealthiest people on Earth—will determine the future of humanity.
“comprehensive” legislative framework on AI that is all of four pages long—not quite so comprehensive. In the midst of a massive and unprecedented attack on the working class of this country, the Trump administration's solution says:
Congress should not create any new federal rulemaking body
to regulate AI.
Leave the multibillionaires running the industry alone. They make a lot of campaign contributions—the rich are getting richer. Leave them alone.
the Trump administration's solution says:
States should not be permitted to regulate AI development.
In other words, instead of the U.S. Congress representing the interests of ordinary Americans, the Trump administration and many Members of Congress—in both parties, by the way—want to allow a handful of billionaires to race forward to develop AI for increased power and wealth for themselves. That is the bad news, and it is pretty scary news.
Now, here is the good news: The American people—despite the inactivity of Congress, the American people are fighting back. In community after community, Americans are organizing against data centers that are powering the AI revolution, and they are winning, taking on very powerful corporations. And many of these communities are deeply red, conservative; some are progressive. But ordinary people look around them and say: You know what. We don't think these data centers are going to do our community any good. They are going to raise our rates, put pressure on our water, destroy the local environment. We don't want them. In fact, more than 100 local communities around the country have enacted moratoriums on data centers, and 12 States are pushing forward with statewide moratorium proposals.
near the discussion that it deserves. Three years ago, in March of 2023, more than 1,000 leading AI experts, including Elon Musk, Yoshua Bengio, Stuart Russell, and many, many others—these are leaders in industry—called for AI labs to “immediately pause for at least 6 months,” and if such a pause were not enacted, called on governments to “step in and institute a moratorium.”
They recognized that “advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth, and should be planned for and managed with commensurate care and resources.”
knowledgeable people on AI in the world—they asked a series of questions:
Should we let machines flood our information channels with
propaganda and untruth? Should we automate away all the jobs,
including the fulfilling ones? Should we develop nonhuman
minds that might eventually outnumber, outsmart, obsolete and
replace us? Should we risk loss of control of our
civilization?
Such decisions must not be delegated to unelected tech
leaders. Powerful AI systems should be developed only once we
are confident that their effects will be positive and their
risks will be manageable.
And I agree with what these scientists and industry leaders said. We need to slow down the development of AI to give democracy, to give ordinary people, a chance to catch up.
come out, and there has been no pause, and there has been no action of significance on the part of Congress.
development of new AI data centers. A moratorium will give us the chance to figure out how to make sure that AI benefits the working families of this country, not just a handful of billionaires who want more and more wealth and more and more power. A moratorium will give us the time to figure out how to ensure that AI is safe and effective and prevent the worst outcomes. A moratorium will give us the time to figure out how to make sure AI does not harm our environment or jack up the electric bills that we pay. Bottom line: A moratorium will give the American people the time to determine how we can make AI and robotics work for them, not just a few wealthy people.
We need to pass this moratorium here. We need to slow down the development of AI around the world, and we need to bring the international community together to address the risk posed by AI.
the world, there is deep concern about the safety of AI and the possible loss of human control over AI.
revolution in the history of humanity. It will impact all of us in so many ways. Yet Congress remains too busy raising contributions from the industry rather than standing up for the needs of the working people. That has got to change.
finally pass a moratorium, slow this down, and make AI robotics work for all of us, not just the few.
I yield the floor.
The PRESIDING OFFICER (Ms. Lummis). The Senator from Delaware.
SAVE AMERICA ACT
Mr. COONS. Madam President, the business of this body today has been the so-called SAVE America Act, a legislative proposal from my colleagues in the Republican Party that is presented as a simple voter ID bill. Who could be against that, requiring ID to vote?
characterized as the “Save Republicans From Accountability Act,” the bill that is designed to make it much harder to vote for tens of millions of Americans. And so to try and address some of the underlying problems, challenges, with this bill, I have offered several amendments, and I want to speak to them this evening.
about this bill love to say how popular voter ID is: 83 percent of Americans support it. Well, if my Republican colleagues believe we should pass this bill because of its popularity, shouldn't we start with another policy that is even more popular? Eighty-seven percent of Americans believe criminal background checks should be required for all gun purchases. That would mean closing existing loopholes that allow folks in the United States to purchase weapons without going through the background check process.
leftist group; it is from FOX News. Of course, universal background checks are popular. Americans are sick of the daily tragedies of gun violence in our communities across our country. They are sick of attacks in schools, in grocery stores, at concerts, in churches, in communities. They are sick and tired of tiny coffins. So I have introduced an amendment to the SAVE Act, adding a provision that would require universal background checks. So let's get this popular and bipartisan amendment passed. And if, as my colleagues claim, the SAVE America Act is not a burden but actually a protection of the right to vote, shouldn't other constitutional rights, fundamental freedoms, be subject to the same sorts of rules? Forty-seven thousand Americans were killed in gun violence in 2023, the leading cause of death for children and teens in many States.
who are not citizens voting. It is a solution in search of a problem. The Heritage Foundation—the Heritage Foundation—went through and looked, over decades, over all the ballots cast in 23 years and found 77 proven cases of ballots cast by noncitizens. That is a tiny percentage.
the bill advanced by my colleagues? My amendment would bring the same restrictions that the SAVE America Act wants to bring to voting to gun buying. If you need a passport and a birth certificate to vote, why not to buy a semiautomatic rifle? All of our constitutional rights should be protected, so why not apply the standards to the Second Amendment that my colleagues hope to apply to the right to vote?
I hope we will take it up, debate it, and pass it.
America Act. The SAVE America Act takes away the ability to register to vote by mail or online. You have to go in person to a specific place with documents, and yet millions of Americans live in rural areas, hours away from these relevant government offices. What if you can't drive? What if you can't take time off of work? What about the cost of all that gas as the price of gas keeps skyrocketing? It would take away the ability to reregister and to vote for these rural Americans. So I filed an amendment that says: For those Americans who live 50 miles away or more from the closest election office, they can register by mail or online.
can't get a new passport online or by mail. You have to show up in person at a government office to apply, then get to the election office to register once you get your passport. How many more hoops do my Republican colleagues want to make rural voters jump through in order to vote?
passport office or an election office to apply for their passport online or by phone.
The cost of living keeps going up. To get a passport doesn't just take time and travel, it costs $165. So I filed an amendment that would make passports for the purposes of voting free for American citizens.
The SAVE America Act has another basic flaw. It would make it difficult to vote for the nearly 70 million American women who changed their name in marriage, where their current name is different than the name on their birth certificate. That includes, obviously, many people of concern but particularly my wife and my mother have different last names today than they did the day they were born.
America Act is it allows those women to vote if they have a passport. Yet millions of Americans do not have passports, and the cost and the difficulty of getting them, I think, is too big a barrier to voting.
What about veterans? Will we actually make them drive for hours to reregister? I am working on an amendment to partner with the VA to make it easier for veterans to administer.
these are the few I will bring up this evening because, before we get to a final vote on the SAVE America Act, we need to perfect it because the right to vote is a sacred right in America, and this is a bill in search of a problem, not solving that problem.
Madam President, the Trump administration owes my constituents money. It owes a lot of Americans money. The administration owes you $166 billion in illegal tariff revenue. Just over a year ago with what he called “Liberation Day,” President Trump imposed wildly irresponsible tariffs on virtually every country on Earth, including our closest allies and those with whom he concluded trade deals like Canada and Mexico. It has damaged our relationships abroad, it has harmed our national security, and frankly, it has imposed what is the equivalent of a national sales tax on hundreds of millions of consumers.
by a 6-to-3 majority that those tariffs are illegal, that under the Constitution, the tariff power—the taxing power—is assigned to the Congress, not to the President. Trump promised Americans he would bring down costs on day one, but through tariffs did the exact opposite. If someone had stolen money out of your wallet, out of your family's bank account, you would want it back.
The average American household has paid $1,700 in tariffs now declared illegal by the Supreme Court. Our President took that money out of the pockets of Americans and should now give it back, so I am here demanding Delaware's money back for Delawareans. I am a proud cosponsor of a bill to do just that. Families need that money back now because they are increasingly struggling.
Because of the war in Iran, gas in Delaware was $2.87 a gallon just over a month ago; it is now, today, $3.79. The cost of groceries have gone up. The cost of healthcare has gone up. The cost of electricity has gone up. The cost of gas has gone up. Why are these costs going up? Partly the reckless war with Iran, but also tariffs. After the Supreme Court struck down the IEEPA tariffs—that is the law on which they were based—Trump proposed and put in place a new 10-percent global tariff.
One of the things I get called about the most is the cost of housing. Our little State of Delaware needs to build 24,000 new homes by 2030 to meet the demands for housing, yet many of the key inputs—lumber from Canada, drywall from Mexico, fixtures and features, the faucets and bathroom vanities—imported from outside our country face stiff tariffs.
Exclusion Act would eliminate those tariffs and bring those costs back down because this just isn't right or fair to the people of Delaware and our Nation—folks who are building and innovating, folks who are farming, folks who are launching small businesses, folks just trying to put food on the table, clothes on their kids' backs, and send them to school and keep them safe. They have paid too much in tariffs, and our President should pay our people back.
I yield the floor.