The US is advancing AI safety through state and federal action

From state capitals across the country to Washington to international convenings, serious approaches to frontier AI governance are taking shape. Together, they are advancing a democratic vision for AI.

California, New York, and most recently Illinois have advanced frontier safety legislation that helps move the country toward a common baseline for governing the most powerful AI systems.

These efforts reflect momentum behind what OpenAI calls reverse federalism : states helping establish a shared direction through a common framework. As state-led work converges with efforts underway at the federal level, a national standard is beginning to take shape, laying the foundation for a US-led global AI framework. We believe the best way to ensure AI benefits the many, not just the few, is for critical decisions—starting with frontier safety—to be made by democratic governments, not solely by frontier labs.

And if safety is the priority, such a national standard is the best policy approach to ensure (a) the US continues to lead in innovation and not be undermined by a patchwork of regulations that would slow the ability to build out a global democratic AI stack that will optimize for the good guys having the tools they need to defend against bad actors seeking to misuse AI in areas like cybersecurity; and (b) put the US in the strongest position to take the national standard and create a global approach for the safe deployment of AI that is built on democratic values. If we want to create a safety framework that will truly prioritize getting in place a national and international standard—which is what will best support the safe deployment of AI—it will take hard work, a seriousness of purpose and a strategy that connects the states, the federal government, and the international conversation. A performative or virtue signaling approach will not get the job done here—chaos at the state level is not in the best interest of a durable approach to safety, it will only lead to more chaos.

A federal testing framework will help get advanced AI tools into the hands of government, critical infrastructure defenders, allies, and other trusted partners. In doing so, it will strengthen democratic institutions and help build a US-led democratic AI stack. Now is the time to use America’s innovation lead in support of democratic AI.

Congress is moving as well. Lawmakers in both chambers and on both sides of the aisle—including most recently Reps. Jay Obernolte and Lori Trahan—have taken note of developments in the states and the executive branch and have put forward proposals for a federal framework. No discussion draft with a realistic path to passage will be perfect. But we view this work as a productive step forward and believe many of its provisions are thoughtful and worthy of support.

Ultimately, the United States would be best served by a national framework grounded in that principle. But in the absence of one, states can move us there by passing laws that mirror one another. Step by step, they can create a de facto national standard.

For that approach to succeed, states should continue aligning on the core elements, as California, New York, and Illinois have. Broadly speaking, those elements are:

A documented safety framework with risk assessments for frontier models and public disclosure of those assessments and their results.