In recent weeks, US lawmakers have organized to ban TikTok, a Chinese-owned app. President Joe Biden has reinforced his commitment to overcoming China’s technological rise. And the Chinese government has added chips from Intel and AMD to an import blacklist.
Now, as the technological and economic cold war between the United States and China accelerates, Silicon Valley leaders are taking advantage of the fight to press their interests in another promising field of technology: artificial intelligence (AI).
On May 1, more than 100 technology chiefs and investors, including Alex Karp, director of defense contractor Palantir, and Roelof Botha, managing partner of venture capital firm Sequoia Capital, will descend on Washington for a conference a day and a private dinner focused on promoting greater suspicion towards China’s advances in artificial intelligence.
Dozens of lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., will also attend the event called the Hill & Valley Forum, which will include talks and discussions with members of a new House task force. focused on AI.
Technology executives plan to use the event to directly lobby against comprehensive rules applicable to artificial intelligence that they consider onerous, as well as to request more public spending on technology and research to support its development. They also plan to call for easing immigration restrictions to bring more artificial intelligence experts to the United States.
The event highlights a rare area of agreement between Washington and Silicon Valley, which have long clashed over issues such as data privacy, protecting children online and even China.
“At the end of the day, whether you work in industry or government or whatever your side of the aisle is, we play for Team America,” said California Rep. Jay Obernolte. He is also the Republican chair of the House artificial intelligence task force and will deliver the conference’s keynote address.
Following the rise in the last year of generative artificial intelligence—technology that has the potential to radically change productivity, innovation, and labor trends—lobbying on the issue has exploded. Last year, more than 450 companies, nonprofits, universities and trade groups reported that they had lobbied on artificial intelligence issues, more than double the number from the previous year, according to OpenSecrets, a nonprofit research group. profit. Palantir more than doubled its lobbying spending last year to $5 million, its highest level ever.
As tech leaders capitalize on anti-China fervor in Washington, civil society groups and academics warn that debates over competition for tech leadership could undermine efforts to regulate potential harms, such as the risks that some artificial intelligence tools They can extinguish jobs, spread disinformation and interfere in elections.
“The dynamics of this race between the United States and China have profound implications, because the flip side of reining in China is low friction and regulation for American companies,” said Amba Kak, CEO of research firm AI Now Institute and former senior advisor on artificial intelligence at the Federal Trade Commission.
AI experts say China is at least a year behind the United States in generative artificial intelligence and may be falling further behind, although a new study suggests it is gaining in talent.
The event in May is hosted by Jacob Helberg, a senior adviser at Palantir and a member of the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission, which reports to Congress on national security threats posed by China. This year’s forum has expanded from the first meeting it hosted last year, which was a private dinner focused primarily on the threat from TikTok, owned by Beijing-based ByteDance.
In addition to artificial intelligence, legislators who will speak at the Capitol event will pressure the Senate to pass a law banning TikTok, and Tom Mueller, one of SpaceX’s first employees, will talk about the space race between the United States and China. Among those attending will be Senator Mike Rounds, Republican of South Dakota and the ranking member of the Armed Services Committee, and Representative Ritchie Torres, Democrat of New York on the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party .
“Tech companies can no longer be neutral,” Helberg said, adding that he is recusing himself from any work on the US-China Economic and Security Review Commission that involves contracts that could give Palantir an advantage.
The venture capital investors who will attend the event have dozens of investments related to artificial intelligence. Sequoia has invested in more than 70 artificial intelligence companies. Khosla Ventures, a $15 billion venture capital firm, has several investments, including in OpenAI, the company behind the chatbot ChatGPT.
“It has become even more obvious, even more critical, that we treat China as an adversary,” said Vinod Khosla, the head of Khosla Ventures who will speak at the forum. “What worries me is Western values versus a different set of values in China.”
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