March 25, 2026
Mr. Sanders introduced the following bill; which was read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation
To impose a moratorium on the construction of new data centers until legislation is enacted that safeguards the public from the dangers of artificial intelligence.
Section 1. Short title
This Act may be cited as the Artificial Intelligence Data Center Moratorium Act
.
Sec. 2. Findings
Congress finds that—
(1)
leading experts and industry leaders have warned about catastrophic consequences from unchecked artificial intelligence development and deployment, including—
(A)
Elon Musk, the wealthiest person alive, and worth $826,600,000,000 as of the date of introduction of this Act, who stated that AI and robots will replace all jobs. Working will be optional.
and that artificial intelligence is akin to summoning the demon
;
(B)
Dario Amodei, the CEO of Anthropic, who predicted that AI could displace half of all entry-level white collar jobs in the next 1 to 5 years.
and that humanity is about to be handed almost unimaginable power, and it is deeply unclear whether our social, political, and technological systems possess the maturity to wield it.
;
(C)
Demis Hassabis, the head of Google’s Deepmind, who stated that the AI revolution will be 10 times bigger than the industrial revolution and 10 times faster;
(D)
Jeff Bezos, the fourth-richest person in the world and worth $233,000,000,000 as of the date of introduction of this Act, who has reportedly pushed his staff for years to think big and envision what it would take for Amazon to fully automate its operations with plans to replace at least 600,000 warehouse workers with robots;
(E)
Bill Gates, worth $101,000,000,000 as of the date of introduction of this Act, who predicted that humans won’t be needed for most things,
such as manufacturing products, delivering packages, or growing food over the next decade due to artificial intelligence;
(F)
Mustafa Suleyman, the CEO of Microsoft AI, who said that most white-collar work will be fully automated by an AI within the next 12 to 18 months
;
(G)
Jim Farley, the CEO of Ford, who predicted that artificial intelligence will eliminate literally half of all white-collar jobs in the U.S.
within the next decade;
(H)
Larry Ellison, the sixth-richest person in the world and worth $203,000,000,000 as of the date of introduction of this Act, who said that there will be an artificial intelligence-powered surveillance state where citizens will be on their best behavior, because we’re constantly recording and reporting everything that is going on.
;
(I)
Dr. Geoffrey Hinton, considered to be the godfather
of artificial intelligence, who stated that he believes there is a 10 to 20 percent chance [for artificial intelligence] to wipe us out.
; and
(J)
Mark Zuckerberg, the fifth-richest person in the world and worth $214,000,000,000 as of the date of introduction of this Act, is building a data center in the State of Louisiana that is the size of Manhattan and will use 3 times the quantity of electricity that the entire city of New Orleans uses every year; and
(2)
leading experts and the heads of the major artificial intelligence companies have called for regulation and reasonable pauses to the development of artificial intelligence to ensure the safety of humanity, including—
(A)
Elon Musk, the head of xAI, who stated—
(i)
in 2018 the following: Mark my words. AI is far more dangerous than nukes. So why do we have no regulatory oversight? This is insane.
; and
(ii)
in 2025 that he had a lot of AI nightmares
and would certainly slow down AI and robotics
if he could;
(B)
Demis Hassabis, the head of Google’s Deepmind, who said in 2026 that he would support an AI pause if he knew other countries and companies also paused development;
(C)
Dario Amodei, the head of Anthropic, who said in 2026 that he would be absolutely in favor of trying
to slow down AI development if other countries also slowed down;
(D)
Sam Altman, the head of OpenAI, who, in 2023, wrote that we need some degree of coordination among the leading development efforts to ensure that the development of superintelligence occurs in a manner that allows us to both maintain safety and help smooth integration of these systems with society
and that an effective global regulatory framework including democratic governance
is needed;
(E)
more than 1,000 business leaders in the Big Tech industry, prominent scientists, and artificial intelligence researchers and academics, including Elon Musk, Steve Wozniak (co-founder of Apple), and Evan Sharp (co-founder of Pinterest), who, in March 2023, cosigned an open letter entitled Pause Giant AI Experiments
which stated the following: We must ask ourselves: Should we let machines flood our information channels with propaganda and untruth? Should we automate away all the jobs, including the fulfilling ones? Should we develop nonhuman minds that might eventually outnumber, outsmart, obsolete and replace us? Should we risk loss of control of our civilization? Such decisions must not be delegated to unelected tech leaders…Therefore, we call on all AI labs to immediately pause for at least 6 months the training of AI systems more powerful than GPT-4. This pause should be public and verifiable, and include all key actors. If such a pause cannot be enacted quickly, governments should step in and institute a moratorium.
; and
(F)
artificial intelligence pioneers Geoffrey Hinton and Yoshua Bengio and other technology leaders, who have called for a prohibition on the development of superintelligence, not lifted before there is broad scientific consensus that it will be done safely and controllably, and strong public buy-in
.
Sec. 3. Moratorium on construction of new artificial intelligence data centers
(a) Definition of artificial intelligence data center
In this section, the term artificial intelligence data center means all the buildings, equipment, structures, and other stationary items, such as server racks, that—
(1)
are located on a single site or on contiguous, adjacent, or otherwise connected sites;
(2)
are owned or operated by the same entity or by any entity that controls, is controlled by, or is under the common control of that entity, regardless of whether the site is a single-occupant or multi-occupant facility; and
(3)
(A)
are used for the development or operation of artificial intelligence models at scale; or
(B)
(i)
have a maximum rated power capacity or total peak power load in excess of 20 megawatts; and
(ii)
are designed or equipped—
(I)
to deliver 20 kilowatts or more of electrical power to a single server rack; or
(II)
to utilize cooling systems that circulate liquid to individual hardware components or submerge electronic hardware in liquid.
(b) Moratorium
Beginning on the date of enactment of this Act, the construction or upgrading of new or existing artificial intelligence data centers may not commence or proceed until—
(1)
1 or more laws are enacted that ensure that—
(A)
the Federal Government shall review and approve artificial intelligence products before those products are released, for the purpose of ensuring that those products are safe and effective and do not threaten the health and well-being of working families, privacy and civil rights, and the future of humanity;
(B)
the economic gains of artificial intelligence and robotics will benefit workers, not just the wealthy owners of Big Tech companies, including by—
(i)
putting policies in place to prevent job displacement due to artificial intelligence; and
(ii)
ensuring the wealth generated by those companies is shared with the people of the United States; and
(C)
with respect to any artificial intelligence data center built or upgraded after the termination of the moratorium under this subsection—
(i)
the artificial intelligence data center does not increase utility or electricity bills of consumers;
(ii)
the artificial intelligence data center does not exacerbate the threat of climate change or harm the environment;
(iii)
communities that would be affected by the artificial intelligence data center are empowered to approve or reject the construction or upgrading of that artificial intelligence data center;
(iv)
no government subsidy is provided for the construction, upgrading, or operation of that artificial intelligence data center; and
(v)
the artificial intelligence data center creates union jobs with strong labor standards, including payment of prevailing wages and use of registered apprenticeship programs and project labor agreements; and
(2)
a provision in the 1 or more laws described in paragraph (1) expressly terminates the moratorium under this subsection.
(c) Reports
(1) In general
The Secretary of Energy shall—
(A)
submit to Congress quarterly reports on artificial intelligence data centers; and
(B)
make those quarterly reports publicly available on the website of the Department of Energy.
(2) Contents
A report submitted by the Secretary of Energy under paragraph (1) shall include, at a minimum, for the period covered by the report and with respect to each artificial intelligence data center—
(A)
all financial vehicles involved in the operation of the artificial intelligence data center;
(B)
the water usage of the artificial intelligence data center;
(C)
the energy usage and infrastructure needs of the artificial intelligence data center;
(D)
the on- and off-site greenhouse gas emissions of the artificial intelligence data center, including the results of fenceline air quality monitoring;
(E)
the wastewater discharge and thermal outputs of the artificial intelligence data center;
(F)
the cooling chemicals used at the artificial intelligence data center;
(G)
the noise levels at the artificial intelligence data center;
(H)
information on wages and benefits provided to workers at the artificial intelligence data center;
(I)
the number of temporary and permanent jobs created at the artificial intelligence data center;
(J)
agreements entered into by the artificial intelligence data center relating to land acquisitions, utilities, or government entities, if any; and
(K)
a certification that the artificial intelligence data center has not utilized any Federal, State, or local subsidies.
(3) Verification
The Secretary of Energy may obtain and verify information relating to the moratorium under subsection (b) and reporting requirements described in paragraph (2), including by—
(A)
issuing subpoenas;
(B)
requiring written interrogatories;
(C)
conducting inspections; and
(D)
conditioning future permitting on compliance with this section.
Sec. 4. Export controls on computing infrastructure hardware
(a) Definitions
In this section:
(1) Computing infrastructure hardware
The term computing infrastructure hardware means semiconductors, integrated circuits, and products containing integrated circuits, including computers, networking equipment, and data storage systems.
(2) Export; in-country transfer; reexport
The terms export
, in-country transfer
, and reexport
have the meanings given those terms in section 1742 of the Export Control Reform Act of 2018 (50 U.S.C. 4801).
(b) Export controls
On and after the date of the enactment of this Act, the Secretary of Commerce shall prohibit the export, reexport, or in-country transfer of computing infrastructure hardware for an end-use described in subsection (c)—
(1)
to or in any country that does not have in effect statutes or regulations that are comparable to the laws described in section 3(b)(1); or
(2)
to any person in a country described in paragraph (1).
(c) End-Uses described
An end-use referred to in subsection (b) is use—
(1)
in an artificial intelligence data center; or
(2)
otherwise in the training or deployment of artificial intelligence models at scale.