As staff for the Bipartisan House Task Force on AI, I worked with co-chairs Rep. Obernolte, Rep. Lieu, and 22 other Members to convene a dozen expert roundtables on cross-cutting topics in AI (e.g. health AI, AI education, intellectual property). This culminated in a sweeping report of bipartisan findings and recommendations that was unanimously approved by the Task Force. I am proud to have worked closely with bipartisan colleagues to arrive at this consensus report—and considering the gridlocked 118th Congress struggled to pass any non-defense AI laws at all, this bipartisan report was quite the journey! See the full report here.

Some of my personal high level takeaways from the report include:

• AI has definitional challenges which can detract from meaningful conversation, since some discussions use AI as shorthand for generative AI, and some use it as a catchall for data science. While it may be desirable to tackle all of AI’s problems in one go, breaking it down into components is much more tenable.
• AI in specific sectors/uses can serve as a spotlight to existing issues such as inequities, which will need to be addressed deliberately beyond technological interventions.
• Mind your metrics: there’s a lot of groundbreaking technology arising from AI, which brings to the forefront the “unknown unknown” impacts. Creating metrics and evaluations for these is difficult, but must be thoughtfully explored. Deploying AI requires concomitant efforts in anticipating or monitoring widespread outcomes and understanding if current metrics are sufficient.
• Additionally, collaboration and transparency are critical for understanding the impact of technology and for building trust in technology. A lack of common metrics or definitions can purposefully or unintentionally impede efforts for collaboration or transparency, but this does not justify a lack of transparency.

Tech Policy Press assembled some reactions to the report here. It is our hope that this report will set the foundation for substantive legislative discussions during the 119th Congress.

In addition to the Task Force report, I also worked on legislation related to AI research, including as related to NIST’s US AI Safety Institute, the Department of Energy, and small businesses.