White House ties federal preemption of state AI laws to child safety legislation in new deal

Big Tech's desperate last push at AI regulation

For months, Big Tech's Washington lobbyists have chased after the holy grail of pro-AI legislation: preemption. This would be a comprehensive federal law, passed in Congress and signed by the president, applying one set of AI rules across the entire country and overriding the legally messy state-by-state approach to regulation. For months, lobbyists have run into roadblocks and incurred nationwide political blowback, and they now face the possibility that after the midterms, Congress will flip to hostile Democrats unwilling to work with them. But their final, most desperate attempt at preemption is coming with new baggage, related to an entirely different fight in Congress that predates the public launch of ChatGPT: child safety. Earlier this week, reports leaked that the White House had told child safety groups and Big Tech companies that it would endorse a slate of children's online safety laws backed by Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), the coauthor of the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), as part of an overall preemption package. While the issue of online safety does meaningfully overlap with AI, it's only one facet of a much larger, complex set of issues that would need to be addressed in a truly comprehensive law: frontier model safety, discrimination, environmental impact, and so forth. Regardless, the potential deal has hit one snag: The White House had apparently not informed House Republicans, which had just passed their own version of KOSA, that it was going with Blackburn's legislation as a vehicle. Democrats who'd worked with Blackburn on the Senate's flavor of KOSA were allegedly left out of the loop, too. On top of that, there was a separate, bipartisan-backed AI preemption bill currently floating around the House. It resulted in a week of total confusion for backers of either policy: AI preemption and child safety might be lumped together in order to ensure preemption gets signed into law, but whose version of child safety gets passed is unclear. Was it the Senate's stricter KOSA? Was it the looser version backed by House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA)? And where was the White House in all of this? "No one knows really who's driving this thing," a Republican lobbyist for a midsize tech company told The Verge. "Everyone is deeply, deeply, deeply skeptical of [the bill's] movement, because everyone is on such different pages. I think the House is not going to move anything that Blackburn wants." Though the AI regulatory fight has caused huge fissures between GOP leadership and their populist members, President Donald Trump himself has called for the passage of an AI preemption bill, meaning that the Republican Party must somehow make this happen. These days, the White House's policy wonks are trying to finesse a preemption approach influenced by Mike Davis, a Trump-allied lawyer and the founder of the Article III Project, who led a successful attempt to kill a different AI moratorium in the Senate last year. Broadly speaking, to win Davis' approval, preemption law should meaningfully protect a set of values Davis called the "Four Cs": children, conservatives, creators, and communities. Some of those values were included in the White House's proposed draft of a comprehensive AI law, released in March of this year, and the inclusion of KOSA satisfied the "children" requirement. But Davis told The Verge that he wanted any legislation to address all four. "There is no chance in hell AI preemption will pass if it does not address the Four Cs. I will make damn sure of that. Again." Getting KOSA passed, however, involves reconciling a massive difference between the House and Senate versions of the same bill. The Senate's version would require tech companies to assume a "duty of care," preemptive measures to protect young users, and would extend that responsibility to AI companies as well. However, the House version, spearheaded by Scalise, diluted that provision late last November, to the fury of child safety advocates. The House's exclusion from the White House's discussions, therefore, was notable to onlookers. "[Blackburn] genuinely does not want House KOSA," noted Michael Toscano, senior fellow and director of the Family First Technology Initiative for the conservative Institute for Family Studies. Even if Trump were to whip the House Republicans into line, they'd have another problem: the congressional Democrats, who'd also learned of Blackburn's negotiations with the White House at the same time the House Republicans did. Though Senate KOSA was cosponsored by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) and overwhelmingly passed 91-3 in 2024, they had not been aware that their legislation would now be handcuffed to the unpopular goal of AI preemption. "If they [Blackburn and the White House] are looking at a standalone bill, it'll have to go through the Senate," said an AI policy advocate, noting that a new version of this bill would then require 60 votes -- and therefore, Democrats -- to pass. And even if the bill had some amount of popularity, the schedule might not allow for it. "It is mid June. You have a month and a half before people leave for [five-week] recess. And then it's [general] election season," said the AI policy advocate. "There's just no way." The remaining weeks on the legislative calendar are already being sucked up by more immediate matters: the renewal of FISA, an immigration crackdown package, increased defense spending for Trump's war with Iran, a crypto market structure bill, affordability measures, and the controversial SAVE America election bill. Oh, and the regular budget items like Medicaid. Having preemption and KOSA chained together presents Big Tech with a difficult choice: Do they want a blanket federal AI preemption more than they want immunity from "duty of care"? And they don't have much time to make this choice, noted the Republican tech lobbyist, especially if Democrats take one chamber. "After the election, what incentive do the Democrats have to support anything? Like, why wouldn't they say, 'Fuck you, we're gonna do our thing in the new Congress?' I'm deeply skeptical." Austin Carson, the former head of Nvidia's government relations operations and the founder of SeedAI, a nonprofit focused on increasing access to AI for local communities, was more dubious that the KOSA-preemption shotgun marriage of convenience would succeed. "I can't imagine a scenario where [this bill] would move," he told The Verge. "I cannot imagine it."

White House offers to trade state AI preemption for federal online safety laws in new deal with Congress

The White House wants to preempt state AI laws for three years in exchange for passing KOSA, the NO FAKES Act, and age verification. Free speech groups object. The White House is negotiating with key senators to bundle federal preemption of state AI laws with three online safety bills, Axios reported. Senator Marsha Blackburn is leading the effort to finalise legislative text. The package would block state AI regulation for three years in exchange for passing the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), the NO FAKES Act, and a federal age verification mandate. The deal represents the administration's latest attempt to strip states of the ability to regulate AI. Congress has already rejected preemption twice. The Senate voted 99-1 to remove an AI preemption provision from the One Big Beautiful Bill Act earlier this year. States have accelerated in the opposite direction, with 1,208 AI bills introduced in 2025 and 145 enacted. This time, the administration is trying a different route: attaching preemption to legislation that has bipartisan appeal. KOSA would require social media platforms to restrict content deemed harmful to minors, with enforcement powers given to the Federal Trade Commission. The NO FAKES Act would protect individuals from AI-generated deepfakes of their likeness. Age verification would mandate identity checks for online services. Free speech groups are alarmed. The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), a Koch-funded conservative organisation, warned that "taken together, these bills would fundamentally change the internet as we know it." FIRE argues KOSA would give the FTC broad power to hold platforms accountable for lawful speech, and that age verification would effectively end anonymous internet use. The Intercept has reported that KOSA's age verification requirements would make it nearly impossible to browse the internet anonymously, a concern that spans the political spectrum. The legislation would give whichever administration controls the FTC significant leverage over how platforms moderate content for roughly 71% of US adults who regularly use Instagram alone. The AI preemption component would formally establish a Center for AI Standards and Innovation and require certain developers to address risks before releasing models. A Blackburn spokesperson said the package is not "blanket preemption of all laws regulating AI or child safety" but structured as subject-matter preemption affecting specific areas. The timing coincides with progressive states moving to restrict AI data centre construction and hold tech companies liable for harms their AI systems cause. The administration frames preemption as necessary for national competitiveness, but critics argue it would remove the most active layer of AI oversight at precisely the moment states are filling a federal vacuum. Whether the deal can pass is uncertain. The administration's AI agenda has moved cautiously on regulation while pushing hard on adoption. Bundling online safety with preemption is a gambit to get both through Congress in one vote. The question is whether senators will accept a three-year freeze on state AI laws as the price of protecting children online.

Scoop: White House, Hill relaunch effort to block state AI laws

Why it matters: States are increasingly passing stronger AI laws and the Trump administration is feeling the heat to get something done. * The talks are aiming to pair one of the tech industry's top priorities -- overriding state AI laws -- with legislation aimed at protecting kids online and combating deepfakes. Behind the scenes: Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) is leading the negotiations, per a spokesperson, which include the Kids Online Safety Act and other tech-related measures. * "Senator Blackburn is spearheading the negotiation with the White House to finalize legislative text of an AI preemption package that includes protections for kids, creators, and communities through the Senate version of KOSA, the NO FAKES Act, and age verification requirements," a Blackburn spokesperson said. * "The White House continues to proactively engage across government and industry," a White House official said. The big picture: The maneuvering between Congress and the White House shows that a bipartisan proposal from Reps. Jay Obernolte (R-Calif.) and Lori Trahan (D-Mass.) isn't the likely vehicle for AI policy in this Congress. * That bill would preempt state AI laws for three years, formally establish the Center for AI Standards and Innovation and require certain developers to address risks prior to releasing models. Catch up quick: The last time the Trump administration tried to preempt the states, Republicans were inundated with pushback from advocacy groups and state lawmakers across the country. * Blackburn's support, which the White House did not previously have, would be key for passage. * The Obernolte-Trahan bill was also met with pushback from groups saying states should be free to regulate. The revival of the preemption fight comes on the heels of Trump signing an AI and cyber executive order last week that includes voluntary pre-deployment testing of frontier models. The bottom line: This flurry of AI action will ultimately be hard to pull off as August recess in an election year nears.

White House negotiating federal preemption of state AI laws in exchange for Hill priorities

The White House is negotiating with Capitol Hill to secure federal preemption of some state regulations on artificial intelligence (AI) in exchange for technology policies related to kids safety and deepfake protections. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) is "spearheading" the negotiations with the White House to finalize text for an AI preemption package, the senator's spokesperson told The Hill on Tuesday. The package will also include "protections for kids, creators, and communities." These policies would come through the Senate version of the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), a long-debated social media accountability measure, along with the NO FAKES Act (Nurture Originals, Foster Artistry and Keep Entertainment Safe Act) to protect artists from AI impersonation. The package would also include age verification requirements, another hotly contested issue in the kids online safety space. The White House has been trying to codify federal preemption of some state AI laws for more than a year, after attempts failed in both the Senate and House last year. Blackburn's spokesperson added the package would be "subject-matter preemption," rather than a "blanket preemption of all laws regulating AI or kids safety." This means states would be prohibited only from legislation on the same subject matters addressed by the package. The Hill reached out to the White House for comment. The negotiations, first reported by Axios, come just days after a bipartisan pair of House lawmakers released their long-awaited draft of a national framework on AI, aiming to preempt some state laws on AI, minimize the technology's risks and expand research. The draft, released by Reps. Jay Obernolte (R-Calif.) and Lori Trahan (D-Mass.), proposes overriding state regulations that target AI model development for three years. This would not necessarily preempt state laws dictating how AI is used once released, according to the text. The road to passage of either of these packages remains an uphill battle as time is running out this Congress. Intraparty and partisan debates, along with fierce pushback from AI safety advocates, have delayed any movement, while the Senate and House do not appear aligned on a path forward.