Casar and Sanders Propose Bill to Ban Artificial Superintelligence Development

The legislation would create the first permanent federal prohibition on a class of AI research, placing the U.S. In a position where regulatory structure, not market competition, would determine...

Rep. Greg Casar (D-TX), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) have introduced legislation that would permanently ban the development of artificial superintelligence in the United States, temporarily pause advanced AI development more broadly, and create a new federal regulatory agency dedicated to artificial intelligence oversight, according to a Bloomberg interview with Rep. Casar published September 4, 2026.

Casar stated in the Bloomberg interview that companies should be barred from pursuing artificial superintelligence outright, while research on AI systems deemed safe and beneficial would be permitted to continue under the proposed framework. The distinction between prohibited and permitted research categories would presumably be defined by the new federal regulator the bill proposes to establish, though the specific criteria have not been publicly detailed in available source material.

Artificial superintelligence refers to a hypothetical class of AI systems that would surpass human cognitive ability across all domains. No such system currently exists. The bill's permanent ban would apply to future development rather than any existing product or service on the market today.

The proposal represents one of the more sweeping AI governance measures introduced in Congress to date. Prior federal AI legislation has generally focused on disclosure requirements, sector-specific use restrictions, or government procurement rules rather than outright prohibitions on categories of research. The Biden administration issued Executive Order 14110 in October 2023 directing federal agencies to assess AI risks, but that order did not carry the force of a statutory ban.

The legislation arrives as major U.S. Technology companies, including Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, and OpenAI, have publicly disclosed large capital commitments to AI infrastructure. Microsoft stated in its fiscal year 2025 earnings report that it planned to spend approximately $80 billion on AI-enabled data center infrastructure. Any statutory pause on advanced AI development would directly affect these capital programs, though the bill's precise scope, including which AI capabilities would trigger the temporary pause, remains unclear from available source material.

The temporary pause provision differs structurally from the permanent ban. A pause implies a defined or conditional stop, after which development could resume under rules set by the proposed federal regulator. The permanent ban on artificial superintelligence, by contrast, would require legislative action to reverse. What would qualify as the threshold between regulated advanced AI and the prohibited superintelligence category is a question the bill's text would need to answer, and that text had not been published in a form available for review as of the date of this article.

The proposal also raises questions about U.S. Competitiveness with China, the European Union, and other jurisdictions investing in AI research and development. Neither Casar nor Sanders addressed that dimension in the Bloomberg interview excerpt available as source material. Whether the bill includes any mechanism to respond if foreign governments continue development without parallel restrictions is not known from available sources.

The bill's path in Congress is uncertain. The Congressional Progressive Caucus, which Casar chairs, represents a portion of the House Democratic caucus. Republicans hold the majority in the current Congress, and no Republican co-sponsors were named in the Bloomberg report. Passage would require bipartisan support or a change in majority control following the 2026 midterm elections.

The Federal Trade Commission and the Department of Commerce's National Institute of Standards and Technology currently have roles in AI oversight under existing authority. How the proposed new federal AI regulator would relate to those agencies, including whether it would absorb, duplicate, or coordinate with their functions, is not specified in available source material.

The U.S. Economy added 162,000 jobs in August 2026, and the Federal Reserve is weighing its next rate decision against a backdrop that includes the technology sector as one of the primary drivers of capital investment, as reported by The Congressional Times. A statutory slowdown in AI development could affect hiring and investment projections within that sector, though the magnitude of any such effect would depend on the bill's final language and its probability of enactment, both of which remain unknown.