AI regulation becomes an election spending battle
TechFlow reported on June 17, citing Fortune, that the political fight surrounding New York state lawmaker Alex Bores and his campaign for a congressional seat has developed into a direct clash between two major camps in the AI industry. OpenAI and Anthropic are backing different sides through related political action committees and political networks, with spending ranging from several million dollars to the tens-of-millions level.
At the center of the dispute is the New York RAISE Act, which Alex Bores previously advanced. The bill has been described as one of the strictest AI safety regulation efforts in the United States. It would require AI companies to report potential “catastrophic risks,” turning the proposal into the main point of contention in the current political fight.
OpenAI-linked and Anthropic-linked groups take opposite sides
According to the report, “Leading the Future,” a group supported by OpenAI-linked investors and Silicon Valley capital, has already spent more than $7.6 million on advertising in an effort to prevent Alex Bores from winning the seat. The group’s spending shows how the dispute over the RAISE Act has moved beyond policy debate and into campaign advertising and electoral resource competition.
On the other side, Anthropic-related political networks and their investors have committed more than $10 million to support Bores’s campaign. With both sides deploying large sums, the AI regulation issue has shifted from a discussion over policy design into a concrete political confrontation. The contest has also placed the different positions associated with OpenAI and Anthropic into a highly visible electoral setting.