Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is escalating his standoff with President Donald Trump over the future of artificial intelligence regulation, Politico reported on Monday.
At the core of the fight is Trump's controversial new executive order that tries to block states from implementing their own AI regulation that goes beyond that of the federal government, at a moment when the federal government has little to no regulation of AI and few prospects of passing any uniform rules for the nation anytime soon.
Several states, both Democratic- and Republican-controlled, want to fill that void with their own rules, and DeSantis believes Florida should be one of them. He is moving forward with his proposed "AI Bill of Rights," and told reporters at an event at Florida Atlantic University he is confident his actions are compliant with the law.
"Even reading it very broadly, I think the stuff we're doing is going to be very consistent," said DeSantis. "But irrespective, clearly, we have a right to do this."
AI technology has caused a massive surge of economic growth as businesses scramble to research and deploy it, but concerns about whether the industry is driving a bubble, or whether experts truly understand how to keep AI use responsible and predictable. Trump's own supporters are bitterly divided on the issue.
Initially, Republicans had included a 10-year moratorium on state AI regulations in Trump's tax cut megabill, known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. But Republicans stripped that provision after an uproar by several members of the caucus, leaving Trump to try to implement it through an executive order instead.
