What Next: TBD | How A.I. Lost (and Won) the Big Beautiful Debate

Slate Technology

Slate

Society & Culture, Technology, History

4.6 • 636 Ratings

🗓️ 6 July 2025

⏱️ 27 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

As the One Big Beautiful Bill bounced around Congress, one provision—the 10-year moratorium on states making laws to regulate artificial intelligence—fell out. But AI-fans don’t need to worry, there’s still plenty of industry support in the bill. Guest: Will Oremus, technology news analysis writer for the Washington Post. Want more What Next TBD? Subscribe to Slate Plus to access ad-free listening to the whole What Next family and all your favorite Slate podcasts. Subscribe today on Apple Podcasts by clicking “Try Free” at the top of our show page. Sign up now at slate.com/whatnextplus to get access wherever you listen. Podcast production by Evan Campbell and Patrick Fort. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Oh, that's my prime delivery.
0:01.6	What, already?
0:02.7	Only one thing can match the buzz of Prime's fast delivery.
0:06.2	And that's the buzz of Prime's entertainment.
0:09.0	What are we watching?
0:09.7	Heads of state, that new action comedy with Idris Elber as the Prime Minister,
0:13.3	John Sina as the president, and Prianka Chopra Jonas,
0:15.9	as their only hope.
0:17.0	It looks like a blast.
0:18.2	From fast delivery to explosive entertainment, it's on Prime.
0:22.5	For only $899 a month, join now. Content includes limited ads, subscription or to renews.
0:27.5	For more information, go to amazon.com.uk.U.K. slash prime.
0:33.9	I'm not always a great sleeper. And on Monday night, I woke up and went to get myself a glass of water.
0:41.5	Technically, it was early Tuesday morning, and I peeked at my phone to read the news.
0:47.1	I know you shouldn't do that, sleep hygiene, etc., but I did.
0:51.6	The Senate was in the middle of a voterrama on President Trump's domestic policy bill.
0:57.1	I wanted to see what was going on. And when I looked, I saw that the big piece of AI policy,
1:03.6	an amendment to block states from making AI laws, was gone. They took it out of the bill.
1:10.1	I was kind of stunned.
1:12.1	I was surprised. That's Will Oremus from the Washington Post. It makes me feel better that he also didn't see this coming.
1:20.2	It could have gone any of a number of ways, but the way it did in fact go was one of the weirdest ones, I think.
1:30.2	This... it did in fact go was one of the weirdest ones, I think. This was a very contentious issue. It died in this piece of legislation, but something tells me this is not the last
	...

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