The president’s posts about artificial intelligence on the social media platform he founded were met with an unusual volume of criticism.
Page A2From§Eachthe milkman edition — 16 September 2026
Sanders spends 13 days warning AI could end humanity without a vote on his own ban.
As it ran on the front
On September 3, Sen. Bernie Sanders introduced the Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act with Rep. Greg Casar, described by its sponsors as legislation to stop AI oligarchs from building machines beyond human control. Three days earlier, President Trump had already staked out the opposite position, warning on social media that any community that rejected a data center would end up "backwards and poor." The two AI stories were already running in opposite directions before the week Congress needed to notice both of them.
On September 10, Sanders set a date: a bipartisan hearing, scheduled for September 16, on what he called the "extraordinary dangers" of unregulated AI. Three days later, September 13, Speaker Mike Johnson called on AI leaders to sit down with Congress and agree on safety legislation — careful to add that the US could not cede ground to China. He did not mention that a bill doing exactly what he was asking for had already been sitting in Congress for ten days.…
…(cont) On September 15, the alarm got a stage. CBS called it "strange bedfellows": progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders and MAGA provocateur Steve Bannon, standing together to call for AI decisions to be made "humans first." The same day, The Hill reported that Washington had been "caught flat-footed" on AI safety, citing party politics, a narrow legislative window, and no consensus as the reasons the task had gone from difficult to next-to-impossible. The bill answering all three of those excuses was twelve days old and had not needed a hearing to exist — only a vote.
By September 16, the hearing convened as scheduled, and so did the rest of the apparatus. Rep. Bill Foster went on television to discuss the danger. Reporters explained where the legislation stood. Anthropic's CEO published a 3,800-word letter proposing a slowdown, and the watchdog he picked to enforce it turned out to have ties to his own former housemate. Trump defended the data centers on his own platform, and commenters clapped back. Thirteen days after it was introduced, the bill that would have answered the entire hearing sat exactly where it had been on September 3: filed, and waiting.
“They put the guy who wrote the fix on the same stage as the guy admitting there isn't one, cameras rolling — and that bill's sat there thirteen days, because Congress isn't slow, it's picky about which emergencies get a floor vote. Data centers get built while your town's still fighting the utility bill; the fix that already exists gets a press conference instead of a vote. Check whose foot's already on the bill before anybody calls this a mystery.”
“Look, nobody's against safety — Speaker Johnson himself called for AI companies to sit down with Congress, that's leadership. A moratorium, though? While China's racing ahead, we're not about to unilaterally disarm the greatest — did I say "disarm"? Scratch that. The process is working exactly as designed.”
The receipts
Sen. Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon are both pushing the Trump administration to regulate artificial intelligence as industry leaders warn of risks to humanity. CBS News' Caitlin Huey-Burns has more.
Anthropic's CEO Dario Amodei says he has found an outside team that can regulate AI and make sure it doesn’t destroy the world — and it just so happens to have deep ties to his old housemate and the woke Effective Altruism movement.
{beacon} Technology Technology The Big Story Washington caught flat-footed on AI safety Washington is scrambling to manage the abrupt panic around AI development, but party politics, a limited legislative window and lack of consensus make it an uphill, next-to-impossible task. © Greg Nash In the wake of a researcher’s viral warning about…
Congress is reacting to warnings from AI leaders that the technology poses existential dangers. Rep. Bill Foster joins "The Daily Report" to discuss.
The AI debate made for strange bedfellows Tuesday as progressive Sen. Bernie Sanders and MAGA provocateur Steve Bannon appeared at the same event calling for human-centered AI decisions. CBS News' Caitlin Huey-Burns has more.
The growing concerns over AI safety brought together two people from opposite sides of the political spectrum on Tuesday: Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon. Washington Post tech reporter Gerrit De Vynk joins CBS News to discuss where AI legislation stands.
As AI CEOs call for a slowdown, President Trump wants acceleration. But the issue is gaining bipartisan momentum.
· Sanders Sets Briefing on 'Extraordinary Dangers' Posed by Breakneck AI Development from the morgue, 10 Sep 2026
· Bernie Sanders introduces bill to ban artificial superintelligence from the morgue, 3 Sep 2026
· Speaker Johnson says AI leaders must meet with Congress on safety laws after ‘end of humanity’ warnings — but resists calls for moratorium from the morgue, 13 Sep 2026
· What Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei Argued in His Call for AI Slowdown from the morgue, 13 Sep 2026
· Out-of-Touch Trump Says Communities That Reject AI Data Centers Will Be 'Backwards and Poor' from the morgue, 31 Aug 2026
· Twenty years in prison for writing code: Bernie Sanders wages nuclear war on AI from the morgue, 10 Sep 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.