Senator Cantwell - “Let's allow these people to do what they do best, and let's make sure the United States has the right policies in place so that our open AI standard wins the day.”

[Opening remarks] [Q&A]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, pushed AI industry leaders to accelerate the adoption of U.S. AI technology on a global scale at today’s hearing on “Winning the AI Race: Strengthening U.S. Capabilities in Computing and Innovation.” The hearing featured testimony from Sam Altman, Co-Founder and CEO of OpenAI, Dr. Lisa Su, CEO and Chair of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Michael Intrator, Co-Founder and CEO of CoreWeave and Brad Smith, Vice Chair and President of Microsoft Corporation.

Sen. Cantwell emphasized that AI is a race, and our national security and the future of our economy are at stake. The U.S. must win this race to ensure an open and transparent AI future, and collaboration is key.

“Let's get together and figure this out. The faster the United States moves now -- I like this great Paul Romer quote, which was about ‘collaboration is the next phase of innovation.’ If we don't collaborate here – if we throw down on politics instead of getting the policy right – we won't move fast,” Sen. Cantwell said.

Sen. Cantwell also made clear that if we are going to win the global AI race, public-private partnerships are critical and we must invest in the human talent that will make winning possible. She also emphasized that if the United States is to maintain its current leadership role, companies must win in the global marketplace, with U.S.-designed AI built with U.S.-driven standards.

“We are going to move fast because we are going to set standards. I believe those standards should be encouraging very broad distribution of U.S. manufactured and made AI chips and technology, and that we're asking our partners overseas to comply with the rules that we establish,” Sen. Cantwell added.

And she reinforced that the current Administration’s trade and tariff policies put our AI future at risk, stating: “I want to be clear: Export controls are not a trade strategy. They are not a back pocket issue that the President of the United States whips out in trade negotiations.”

In an exchange with Dr. Su, Senator Cantwell elicited the need for an overall export strategy to ensure that U.S. leadership in AI is maintained well into the future.

Here is the exchange:

Sen. Cantwell: Dr. Su, what is your view of this, about how we win, how we protect our objectives …on the export strategy?

Dr. Su: Well, I think there is a clear recognition that we need an export strategy. And so having this conversation is very important. And from our perspective, the idea is to ensure that our allies, and frankly, I use allies in the very broadest sense, get access to the great American technology that we have with the appropriate controls in place. And I think you can do both. To your earlier comment, Ranking Member Cantwell, about the need to have US technologies in those countries, I think those countries are actually very interested in doing that because we do have the best technology today, and using that to really build this broad AI ecosystem is really our opportunity.

Sen. Cantwell: I agree. Thank you so much.

A full transcript of the opening remarks is HERE, and a transcript of the Q&A is HERE.