Harriet Hageman Asks AI Expert About The State Of Global AI ‘Competition’

2 days ago

During a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, Rep. Harriet Hageman (R-WY) questioned Neil Chilson, the Head of AI Policy at the Abundance Institute, about how the United States is faring compared to other countries' artificial intelligence advances.

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00:00Objection. The gentleman from Wyoming is now recognized for five minutes.

00:04Thank you. China is trying to control the global AI sector through extensive

00:09state-directed investments, aggressive subsidies, and protectionist trade measures.

00:15It is making substantial investments to secure its global position through initiatives like

00:20Made in China 2025 and the New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan.

00:27Mr. Chilson, how might China's government subsidies and protectionist policies

00:32affect global competition in AI? So China's model for AI innovation is

00:39very different than the U.S.'s. It's largely state-sponsored. It is driven through a structure

00:47that is designed to make sure that the Chinese Communist Party has its finger in everything.

00:55And it means that the end result is a design-from-the-top ecosystem. They pour a lot

01:02of money into this, and they have talented people. And so they do have surprises occasionally. The

01:07deep-seek AI model that came out, they can get a lot done with that model. Ultimately, however,

01:14I think the U.S. model, if we don't tie one or both hands behind our back, is going to win in

01:21this space, because we have the talent, we have the investment, and we have the ecosystem that

01:28rewards trying new things out and seeing if they work. And so I worry a lot about China. I think

01:37modeling our – and this is why I was a little bit confused about the university question – a

01:43top-down investment model that tries to look like China is not the right model for the U.S.

01:49I'm glad to hear that, and I'm also excited to hear about your optimism,

01:53because what would be the strategic consequences if China achieved dominance in the global AI space?

01:59Well, there's a lot of different consequences, and we could just look at – we could look at

02:03cultural ones, we could look at strategic national security ones, and I think those

02:07are the ones that I think raise the most eyebrows. This technology –

02:11Can you give me some examples?

02:12Yeah. So this technology is very powerful, both in an offensive and defensive manner for cybersecurity,

02:18so both to defend from cybersecurity attacks and to cause them. And so

02:25being ahead in that race matters a lot. A lot of our infrastructure in the U.S. obviously is – needs

02:32to be strong against those types of attacks, and I think that AI has a huge potential to be a

02:36defensive barrier to those types of things, but we need to stay ahead in the race.

02:42Well, I agree with you on that as well. This committee has observed with concern

02:46harmful policies also coming from the EU on privacy, antitrust, censorship, and more.

02:54Now that artificial – now the Artificial Intelligence Act will impose significant

03:00compliance costs on affected companies, particularly American businesses that play

03:05a pivotal role within the AI sector. Mr. Coniglio, how should we as members of Congress be concerned

03:12about the impact of this framework on our constituent businesses, and are there specific

03:19ways in which the EU regulations might disadvantage smaller American AI companies as compared to larger

03:25firms? Thank you very much for the question, Congresswoman. I would say we should be very

03:30concerned about the regulatory approach that the European Union is taking, not just with the AI

03:35Act. One of the things I would say they did learn from the GDPR is now to do regulation that targets

03:40American firms specifically so that they don't burden their smaller firms with regulation,

03:46and that's really been the lesson with the DMA, which is absolutely disproportionately having very

03:51harmful effects on American businesses, really our tech leaders, and it was intended to do so.

03:57So, I think that, as I recall a letter from Chairman Jordan starting to investigate those

04:04practices is very important and something we need to continue to do. So, do you have

04:08recommendations as to what Congress specifically ought to do in this space? It's a very complicated

04:16area. I would note, with respect to potential legislation, in Korea there was a proposed bill

04:21by Representative Miller, I believe, to talk about potential tools in a trade area that could be used

04:27to the extent that regulations are being basically weaponized as de facto protectionist policies

04:32against American companies, and I think that might be absolutely be the right framework to think about

04:36it. Okay. Mr. Chilson, in your testimony you cite how competition is robust and global across

04:46all layers of the AI stack. How should Congress consider protecting American

04:50companies in such an environment, or is such a policy even achievable or worthy of consideration?

04:58So, American companies lead the world in this, so I don't know that they need protection from

05:04Congress, but what they do need is the ability to continue to innovate, build, get the supplies

05:11and the data that they need, and there's a lot in the regulatory space that Congress could

05:16work on. I think, in particular, we've mentioned it a couple times, but one of the biggest threats

05:21is well-intentioned, but often very abstract and not well-developed state-level regulation,

05:28which could limit a lot of this innovation. So, preemption is important. I think it's very

05:33important. Thank you, and I yield back.

Harriet Hageman Asks AI Expert About The State Of Global AI ‘Competition’

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