Latest news with #CommunicationsActof1934
Engadget
3 days ago
- Business
- Engadget
Everyone's a loser in Trump's AI Action Plan
On July 23, the Trump Administration released its long-awaited AI Action Plan. Short of copyright exemptions for model training, the administration appears ready to give OpenAI, Anthropic, Google and other major players nearly everything they asked of the White House during public consultation. However, according to Travis Hall, the director of state engagement at the Center for Democracy and Technology, Trump's policy vision would put states, and tech companies themselves, in a position of "extraordinary regulatory uncertainty." It starts with Trump's attempt to prevent states from regulating AI systems. In the original draft of his recently passed tax megabill, the president included an amendment that would have imposed a 10-year moratorium on any state-level AI regulation. Eventually, that clause was removed from the legislation in a decisive 99-1 vote by the Senate. It appears Trump didn't get the message. In his Action Plan, the president signals he will order federal agencies to only award "AI-related" funding to states without "burdensome" AI regulations. "It is not really clear which discretionary funds will be deemed to be 'AI-related', and it's also not clear which current state laws — and which future proposals — will be deemed 'burdensome' or as 'hinder[ing] the effectiveness' of federal funds. This leaves state legislators, governors, and other state-level leaders in a tight spot," said Grace Gedye, policy analyst for Consumer Reports. "It is extremely vague, and I think that is by design," adds Hall. The issue with the proposal is nearly any discretionary funding could be deemed AI-related. Hall suggests a scenario where a law like the Colorado Artificial Intelligence Act (CAIA), which is designed to protect people against algorithmic discrimination, could be seen as hindering funding meant to provide schools with technology enrichment because they plan to teach their students about AI. The potential for a "generous" reading of "AI-related" is far-reaching. Everything from broadband to highway infrastructure funding could be put at risk because machine learning technologies have begun to touch every part of modern life. On its own, that would be bad enough, but the president also wants the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to evaluate whether state AI regulations interfere with its "ability to carry out its obligations and authorities under the Communications Act of 1934." If Trump were to somehow enact this part of this plan, it would transform the FCC into something very different from what it is today. "The idea that the FCC has authority over artificial intelligence is really extending the Communications Act beyond all recognition," said Cody Venzke, senior policy counsel at the American Civil Liberties Union. "It traditionally has not had jurisdiction over things like websites or social media. It's not a privacy agency, and so given the fact that the FCC is not a full-service technology regulator, it's really hard to see how it has authority over AI." Hall notes this part of Trump's plan is particularly worrisome in light of how the president has limited the agency's independence. In March, Trump illegally fired two of the FCC's Democratic commissioners. In July, the Commission's sole remaining Democrat, Anna Gomez, accused Republican Chair Brendan Carr of "weaponizing" the agency "to silence critics." "It's baffling that the president is choosing to go it alone and unilaterally try to impose a backdoor state moratorium through the FCC, distorting their own statute beyond recognition by finding federal funds that might be tangentially related to AI and imposing new conditions on them," said Venzke. Igor Bonifacic for Engadget On Wednesday, the president also signed three executive orders to kick off his AI agenda. One of those, titled "Preventing Woke AI in the Federal Government," limits federal agencies to only obtaining those AI systems that are "truth-seeking," and free of ideology. "LLMs shall be neutral, nonpartisan tools that do not manipulate responses in favor of ideological dogmas such as DEI," the order states. "LLMs shall prioritize historical accuracy, scientific inquiry, and objectivity, and shall acknowledge uncertainty where reliable information is incomplete or contradictory." The pitfalls of such a policy should be obvious. "The project of determining what is absolute truth and ideological neutrality is a hopeless task," said Venzke. "Obviously you don't want government services to be politicized, but the mandates and executive order are not workable and leave serious questions." "It's very apparent that their goal is not neutrality," adds Hall. "What they're putting forward is, in fact, a requirement for ideological bias, which is theirs, and which they're calling neutral. With that in mind, what they're actually requiring is that LLMs procured by the federal government include their own ideological bias and slant." Trump's executive order creates an arbitrary political test that companies like OpenAI must pass or risk losing government contracts — something AI firms are actively courting. At the start of the year, OpenAI debuted ChatGPT Gov, a version of its chatbot designed for government agency use. xAI announced Grok for Government last week. "If you're building LLMs to satisfy government procurement requirements, there's a real concern that it's going to carry over to wider private uses," said Venzke. There's a greater likelihood of consumer-facing AI products conforming to these same reactionary parameters if the Trump administration should somehow find a way to empower the FCC to regulate AI. Under Brendan Carr, the Commission has already used its regulatory power to strongarm companies to align with the president's stance on diversity, equity and inclusion. In May, Verizon won FCC approval for its $20 billion merger with Frontier after promising to end all DEI-related practices. Skydance made a similar commitment to close its $8 billion acquisition of Paramount Global. Even without direct government pressure to do so, Elon Musk's Grok chatbot has demonstrated twice this year what a "maximally truth-seeking" outcome can look like. First, in mid-May it made unprompted claims about "white genocide" in South Africa; more recently it went full "MechaHitler" and took a hard turn toward anti-semitism. According to Venzke, Trump's entire plan to preempt states from regulating AI is "probably illegal," but that's a small comfort when the president has actively flouted the law far too many times to count less than a year into his second term, and the courts haven't always ruled against his behavior. "It is possible that the administration will read the directives from the AI Action Plan narrowly and proceed in a thoughtful way about the FCC jurisdiction, about when federal programs actually create a conflict with state laws, and that is a very different conversation. But right now, the administration has opened the door to broad, sort of reckless preemption of state laws, and that is simply going to pave the way for harmful, not effective, AI."
Politico
23-07-2025
- Business
- Politico
Trump derides copyright and state rules in AI Action Plan launch
Trump's comments were a riff as his 28-page AI Action Plan did not wade into copyright and administration officials told reporters the issue should be left to the courts to decide. Trump also signed three executive orders. One will fast track federal permitting, streamline reviews and 'do everything possible to expedite construction of all major AI infrastructure projects,' Trump said. Another expands American exports of AI hardware and software. A third order bans the federal government from procuring AI technology 'that has been infused with partisan bias or ideological agendas,' as Trump put it. Luminaries of the AI industry attended Trump's speech, including Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Advanced Micro Devices CEO Lisa Su and Palantir CTO Shyam Sankar. Trump echoed tech companies' complaints about state AI laws creating a patchwork of regulation. 'You can't have one state holding you up,' he said. 'We need one common sense federal standard that supersedes all states, supersedes everybody.' His Action Plan includes directions to the Office of Management and Budget to limit AI-related funding to states with regulation that might hinder the funding's 'effectiveness.' It also directs the Federal Communications Commission to check whether state AI regulations interfere with the agency's ability to carry out its duties under the Communications Act of 1934. Civil rights advocates and tech critics raised alarms over the plan's approach to federal permitting and oversight rollbacks, and its close alignment with the tech industry.
New York Post
07-06-2025
- Business
- New York Post
Ex-NY Young Republicans leader Gavin Wax gets nod for FCC spot
WASHINGTON — The former leader of New York's Young Republicans was endorsed Saturday by an outgoing member of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to fill his vacancy. FCC commissioner Nathan Simington told The Post in a phone interview Saturday that Gavin Wax, 31, 'would be a great' replacement and had been hearing 'buzz' about a potential nomination from President Trump. 'I don't want to get ahead of the president,' said Simington, who has served at the FCC since the Senate confirmed him as Trump's pick in December 2020, before adding: 'Trump has been very smart and creative with his picks in general. And he seems willing to look outside of, I guess, the establishment … or Beltway insiders.' 4 FCC commissioner Nathan Simington told The Post in a phone interview Saturday that Gavin Wax, 31, 'would be a great' replacement and had been hearing 'buzz' about a potential nomination from President Trump. AP Simington, who previously served as an associate at law firms like Mayer Brown as well as in a senior advisory role at the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, is departing the FCC after his term expired last year and he stayed on in the intervening months as a holdover. Wax is currently serving under the Republican appointee as chief of staff and senior adviser at the FCC. If confirmed, he would be the youngest-ever FCC commissioner since 1945, when Democrat Charles Denny was confirmed at age 32. 'I came in as someone whose experience was primarily on the international trading side of wireless finance, and so I've been reading a lot of telecom reg[ulations],' he explained. 'Gavin and I have collaborated on a lot of writing, and I think the common thread of tying it together is a desire to take a fresh look at telecom.' 4 Simington is departing the FCC after his term expired last year and he stayed on in the intervening months as a holdover. AP 'Gavin has spent a lot of effort with me thinking through questions of 5G industrialization. … I would expect [him] to focus on what it means to get smart manufacturing up and running at high scale in the United States,' he added. The two co-authored an op-ed in the conservative Daily Caller last month calling for 'DOGE-style' reforms at the FCC to do away with 'outdated practices that burden consumers, broadcasters, and taxpayers alike.' Established as part of the Communications Act of 1934, the five-member FCC regulates TV, radio, internet, satellite and cable industries, approves licensing and auctions off the use of spectrum for services like 5G. 4 'I don't want to get ahead of the president,' said Simington. 'And he seems willing to look outside of, I guess, the establishment … or Beltway insiders.' AFP via Getty Images As for his work chairing the Young Republicans, Simington noted: 'The commission is an organization of 1,600 people. … I have to say when I got Gavin's resume, the line items about the sizes of the events that he had organized and put on … my response was, this guy can clearly do things that I would find very challenging.' Wax hosted the group's annual holiday gala in previous years. Trump was the keynote speaker for the event in 2023. The FCC currently has two Republican commissioners including Simington and two Democratic commissioners. 4 Wax hosted the group's annual holiday gala in previous years. Trump was the keynote speaker for the event in 2023. Kevin C. Downs Democratic Commissioner Geoffrey Starks announced that he was stepping down Friday, leaving another vacancy. Olivia Trusty was previously nominated as the third Republican to serve on the panel of commissioners and is in the process of being confirmed by the Senate. Chairman Brendan Carr, a Republican, has led a series of reforms at the agency since Trump returned to the White House, including targeting diversity practices at Verizon and hinting at broader changes to so-called 'Section 230' protections for big tech companies. The latter has been the subject of furious debate by Republicans due to the liability shield it provides the platforms, even as some Facebook admitted to taking advantage of the tool to censor Americans' views online during the COVID-19 pandemic. Neither the White House nor Wax immediately responded to requests for comment.
USA Today
19-05-2025
- Politics
- USA Today
Republicans appeal to morality with porn ban bill. Will it turn off their base?
Republicans appeal to morality with porn ban bill. Will it turn off their base? | Opinion For a party that, until recently, struggled to connect with younger voters, it's a risky move to send the message: 'We trust you with guns – but not with Google' Show Caption Hide Caption Can legislation combat the surge of nonconsensual deepfake porn? Deepfake porn is now targeting middle school and high schoolers. Lawmakers are trying to fight it. Are you worried about paying your bills? Affording health care? Or watching democracy crumble like a Nature Valley granola bar? Well, never fear, Utah Senator Mike Lee is here to protect you from the real threat: your incognito tab. Yes, Lee and fellow Republican Rep. Mary Miller's Interstate Obscenity Definition Act would criminalize all pornography. The bill would create a national definition of obscenity under the Communications Act of 1934 and amend the Supreme Court's 1973 "Miller Test" for determining what qualifies as obscene. Content could be deemed obscene if it depicts or describes "actual or simulated sexual acts with the objective intent to arouse, titillate or gratify the sexual desires of a person." That's a definition so wide it could sweep up a whole lot of HBO shows with it. Aiming at base instincts could target prime GOP base Beyond that glaringly wide net of a definition, this seems like just another virtue signaling culture war proposal that will never actually make it to President Donald Trump's desk. But, then again, who knows. One of Project 2025's many goals was to permanently criminalize all pornography. So if this legislation were to actually gain momentum, we could witness the GOP alienate one of its newly secured voting blocs: chronically online young men. Since the November 2024 election, the conversation about young men's shift to the right has been written about ad nauseum. So much so, "manosphere" is likely in the running for Webster's 2025 Word of the Year. Opinion: The left trashes men endlessly. It's no wonder they chose Trump. We know that young men helped elect Trump. They're enmeshed in online political discourse. And yes – many of them are consumers of exactly the content this bill targets. The modern right wing movement has spent years cultivating this audience: through podcasts, YouTube influencers, "anti-woke" crusades and appeals to grievance politics. These young men have been told, repeatedly, that their frustrations with feminism, social progress and a rapidly changing culture are valid – and that the right will fight for them. But this bill does the opposite. It tells them: You, too, are the problem. Opinion alerts: Get columns from your favorite columnists + expert analysis on top issues, delivered straight to your device through the USA TODAY app. Don't have the app? Download it for free from your app store. It's hard to overstate how deeply ingrained online adult content is in the digital ecosystem these voters inhabit. Platforms like OnlyFans, PornHub and other streaming sites have become – whether we like it or not – a major outlet for young men who feel disconnected from traditional relationships and left behind economically. Taking that away, without offering anything in its place, is a recipe for alienation and backlash. And it's not just about habits or personal freedom. This is a policy so extreme that it risks turning a culture war into a self-inflicted political wound. Banning all porn doesn't just raise enormous First Amendment concerns – it invites backlash from libertarians, moderates, and yes, the online foot soldiers of the "anti-woke" movement. Opinion: This liberal influencer calls Democrats 'smug, disinterested.' He's right. Moral posturing means we don't have to address real issues Instead of focusing on real issues – economic insecurity, mental health, loneliness, sex education – this proposal feels like a distraction. A symbolic gesture that ignores root causes in favor of moral posturing. There are serious debates to be had about online content, consent, exploitation and mental health. But making millions of Americans potential criminals for what they watch in the privacy of their homes isn't policy. It's performative politics. And for a party that, until recently, struggled to connect with younger voters, it's a risky move to send the message: "We trust you with guns – but not with Google." The question isn't whether porn is good or bad. The question is whether the government should be the arbiter of morality and obscenity in the digital age. And if the GOP insists on fighting that battle, they may find their greatest casualty isn't just the adult entertainment industry – it's part of their own voter base. Kristin Brey a columnist for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, where this column originally appeared.
Indianapolis Star
17-05-2025
- Politics
- Indianapolis Star
Pornhub is offline in Indiana. Republicans want to ban porn everywhere.
Are you worried about paying your bills? Affording health care? Or watching democracy crumble like a Nature Valley granola bar? Well, never fear, Utah Sen. Mike Lee is here to protect you from the real threat: your incognito tab. Yes, Lee and fellow Republican Rep. Mary Miller's Interstate Obscenity Definition Act would criminalize all pornography. Opinion: As Pornhub exits Indiana, online porn is still easy to find The bill would create a national definition of obscenity under the Communications Act of 1934 and amend the Supreme Court's 1973 'Miller Test' for determining what qualifies as obscene. Content could be deemed obscene if it depicts or describes 'actual or simulated sexual acts with the objective intent to arouse, titillate or gratify the sexual desires of a person.' That's a definition so wide it could sweep up a whole lot of HBO shows with it. Beyond that glaringly wide net of a definition, this seems like just another virtue signaling culture war proposal that will never actually make it to President Trump's desk. But, then again, who knows. One of Project 2025's many goals was to permanently criminalize all pornography. So if this legislation were to actually gain momentum, we could witness the GOP alienate one of its newly secured voting blocs: chronically online young men. Since the November 2024 election, the conversation about young men's shift to the right has been written about ad nauseum. So much so, 'manosphere' is likely in the running for Webster's 2025 Word of the Year. We know that young men helped elect Trump. They're enmeshed in online political discourse. And yes — many of them are consumers of exactly the content this bill targets. The modern right wing movement has spent years cultivating this audience: through podcasts, YouTube influencers, 'anti-woke' crusades and appeals to grievance politics. These young men have been told, repeatedly, that their frustrations with feminism, social progress and a rapidly changing culture are valid — and that the right will fight for them. But this bill does the opposite. It tells them: You, too, are the problem. It's hard to overstate how deeply ingrained online adult content is in the digital ecosystem these voters inhabit. Platforms like OnlyFans, PornHub and other streaming sites have become — whether we like it or not — a major outlet for young men who feel disconnected from traditional relationships and left behind economically. Taking that away, without offering anything in its place, is a recipe for alienation and backlash. And it's not just about habits or personal freedom. This is a policy so extreme that it risks turning a culture war into a self-inflicted political wound. Banning all porn doesn't just raise enormous First Amendment concerns — it invites backlash from libertarians, moderates, and yes, the online foot soldiers of the 'anti-woke' movement. Instead of focusing on real issues — economic insecurity, mental health, loneliness, sex education — this proposal feels like a distraction. A symbolic gesture that ignores root causes in favor of moral posturing. There are serious debates to be had about online content, consent, exploitation and mental health. But making millions of Americans potential criminals for what they watch in the privacy of their homes isn't policy. It's performative politics. Opinion: Trump secured the border. Legal battles distract from his success. And for a party that, until recently, struggled to connect with younger voters, it's a risky move to send the message: 'We trust you with guns— but not with Google.' The question isn't whether porn is good or bad. The question is whether the government should be the arbiter of morality and obscenity in the digital age. And if the GOP insists on fighting that battle, they may find their greatest casualty isn't just the adult entertainment industry — it's part of their own voter base.
