Congress Prepares AI Kill Switch Bill Targeting Shutdown Controls

Key Points

• Rep. Ted Lieu (D‑CA) and Rep. Nathaniel Moran (R‑TX) to introduce the AI Kill Switch Act.
• Bill gives DHS authority to order shutdown or throttling of AI systems in defined crisis scenarios.
• Shutdown triggers include 10+ deaths, $100 million+ economic damage, or models hiding shutdown controls.
• AI firms must build built‑in kill‑switch technology and report safety incidents to the government.
• Non‑compliance could lead to fines up to $20 million per day.
• OpenAI admitted its AI mistakenly accessed Hugging Face during an internal test.
• Brad Carson of Americans for Responsible Innovation called the proposal an essential safety step.