Senators Propose Using Emergency Funds to Develop Non-Defense AI R&D

On May 15, 2024, a bipartisan group of senators released an outline of a solution to drive innovation in the U.S., particularly in AI. The blueprint proposes Congress rapidly ramp up federal spending on AI R&D using “emergency” appropriations.

Led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), a key architect of a similar emergency infusion for semiconductor manufacturing and R&D provided by the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. The group’s other members are Sens. Todd Young (R-IN), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), and Mike Rounds (R-SD).

The proposed solution would fund non-defense AI R&D programs across the government to at least $32 billion per year. This value would match the level proposed in 2021 by the National Security commission on AI (NSCAI). The commission estimated that federal agencies spent about $1 billion on such R&D in fiscal year 2020 and proposed that Congress double that figure each year over five years.

Despite this recommendation by the NSCAI, there has not been even close to this pace of funding.

The proposal identifies priority programs for the funds to be spent on, including:

• A cross-government AI R&D effort that spans the Department of Energy, National Science Foundation, National Institute of Standards and Technology, National Institutes of Health, NASA, and other relevant agencies;
• An “AI-ready data” initiative that has a focus on “fundamental and applied science, such as biotechnology, advanced computing, robotics, and materials science”;
• Efforts authorized by the CHIPS and Science Act that have not been fully funded, including but not limited to NSF’s education programs and its Directorate for Technology, Innovation, and Partnerships, DOE’s advanced computing and microelectronics programs, and the Commerce Department’s regional technology development hubs;
• NSF’s National AI Research Resource and its National AI Research Institutes;
• “AI Grand Challenge” programs that focus in part on developing applications to “fundamentally transform the process of science, engineering, or medicine”;
• NIST’s AI programs as well as construction projects to “address years of backlog in maintaining NIST’s physical infrastructure”; and
• A joint NIST-DOE test bed to “identify, test, and synthesize new materials to support advanced manufacturing through the use of AI, autonomous laboratories, and AI integration with other emerging technologies, such as quantum computing and robotics.”

In their blueprint, the senators recommend funding efforts to mitigate threats from AI-enhanced biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons, including through testbeds and model evaluation tools developed by DOE.

Any initiative will also need buy-in from the House. Schumer said he intends to raise the subject soon with House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), who established his own bipartisan taskforce on AI  in February.

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