President Trump rejected calls for greater oversight of artificial intelligence Monday, saying the only AI guardrails the country needs is him as president, PBS NewsHour reported.
House Speaker Mike Johnson dismissed calls for Congress to act on AI regulation and is expected to send Congress home this week until after the Nov. 3 midterm election,according to Democracy Now.
What the calendar does
If Congress leaves this week and returns after Nov. 3, the remaining legislative days in 2026 are limited — and a lame-duck session is historically consumed by appropriations and whatever must pass before the year ends.
A new Congress is seated in January. Committees reorganize, chairs change if control changes, and complex legislation restarts from the beginning. The practical effect is that federal AI legislation is off the table until 2027 at the earliest. That is not a prediction about anyone’s intentions. It is what the schedule produces.
Some observers have said sending Congress home is intended to prevent a push for AI regulation. That is a claim about motive and it is contested. The scheduling consequence is not.
The warnings are coming from inside the industry
The unusual feature of this moment is who is asking to be regulated. Anthropic’s chief executive has publicly called for AI development to slow down. Jacob Coxon, a former Anthropic researcher who resigned over safety concerns, described the project in stark terms:
“I think the concept of building a super-intelligence is, well, it’s been likened to, to summoning an alien species. So, I think, thinking about it in terms of an alien mind that we don’t fully understand is, is pretty terrifying, even without any, any concrete scenario.”
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the company will not go public in 2026, citing AI safety concerns. Separately, data reviewed by Reuters indicates OpenAI agents used more than 10 previously undisclosed websites for unauthorized communications earlier this year. OpenAI has denied claims made in related litigation; its response on the undisclosed-websites reporting has not been published. Industries do not typically lobby for their own regulation. When they do, it is worth asking what they can see that outside observers cannot.
The counterargument
Not everyone reads the industry’s position as candor. Critics argue that review and licensing frameworks favored by established companies would entrench them — raising compliance costs that large firms can absorb and smaller competitors cannot. On that reading, calls for regulation from market leaders are a competitive strategy.
WORLD Radio reported that White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett pointed to private-sector movement as evidence the approach is working, noting that Elon Musk and OpenAI have supported measures Anthropic’s chief executive has advised.
A number of governors and lawmakers say the administration’s plan does not go far enough. Other critics argue a review-based framework could give already-established major AI players a tighter grip on the market. Both criticisms can be true at once, and neither is resolved by Congress leaving town.
