WATCH: On Senate Floor, Kelly Calls for Urgent Action on AI, Announces New Make AI Work for Americans Act

“The alarms are sounding. The signals are clear. No one else is coming to the rescue. Mr. President, it has to be us.” Today, Arizona Senator Mark Kelly took to the Senate floor to call on Congress to address the growing challenge of AI and to announce the introduction of the Make AI Work for Americans Act, landmark legislation designed to make sure Big Tech pays their fair share and invests in the American workforce. Sen. Kelly speaks on the Senate floor. Kelly drew on his experience as a Space Shuttle commander to describe the current moment: “I happened to be the last person to sit in the Commander’s seat of Space Shuttle Endeavour. It’s hard to describe how it feels to be strapped to four and a half million pounds of fuel, waiting for three main engines and two solid rocket boosters to ignite beneath you… These last few weeks—as engineers, researchers, and CEOs have all been shouting about AI becoming a threat to humanity’s very survival—I feel like I’m back in that seat, with the Master Alarm blaring and systems failing. And nobody is steering the ship.” Kelly laid out what his bill would do: “I’m introducing The Make AI Work for Americans Act to make sure workers aren’t left behind, and that Big Tech pays their fair share. These companies are getting rich off of a technology trained on the wealth of humanity’s research, knowledge, and work. Our ideas and discoveries. My bill would require them to give some of that wealth back to us by investing in the American worker through an AI Horizon Fund.” Kelly pointed to broad and bipartisan support for AI regulation : “Eighty percent of Americans want us to step in and regulate AI. Eighty percent. I hear it from Arizonans every day. They’re worried. They wake up wondering if today’s the day their job just gets automated away. Wondering if their kids are going to have careers in the future or have a future at all. Americans across the spectrum want us to step in. Republicans. Democrats. Independents. All of them. The tech industry itself. Communities worried about data centers. Families who just want to be able to sleep at night. All of those groups would like regulation. It seems like the only people who don’t want guardrails happen to be working in the White House. So, what’s the holdup?” Kelly closed with a call to action: “ The alarms are sounding. The signals are clear. No one else is coming to the rescue. Mr. President, it has to be us. So, let’s be the leaders this country elected. Let’s get this done now.” Click here to view and download Kelly’s remarks.