On June 4, 2026, Representatives Jay Obernolte and Lori Trahan released a discussion draft of the Great American Artificial Intelligence Act. The proposal is a federal Artificial Intelligence bill, but not a general Artificial Intelligence-use law. It would formalize the Center for Artificial Intelligence Standards and Innovation within the Department of Commerce and give it a central role in evaluation, standards development, incident reporting, independent verification, and federal coordination. The center would develop voluntary guidelines and best practices for security, interpretability, evaluation, synthetic content detection, cyber incident response, and national security safeguards.
Since the draft’s mandatory obligations apply primarily to large frontier developers that train highly capable foundation models and generate more than $500mn in annual revenue, the draft bill’s provisions would likely affect only a relatively small number of leading Artificial Intelligence developers. State-law preemption would also be important but limited. In November 2025, a bipartisan coalition of 36 state attorneys general sent a letter to Congress opposing a proposed federal ban on state laws regulating Artificial Intelligence. The draft would not preempt state laws of general applicability, state common-law remedies, or state laws governing implementation, deployment, distribution, offering, or use of Artificial Intelligence systems, products, or services.
The draft would increase fraud-related exposure even outside the frontier-developer context. Deployers, executives, and employees could face higher legal and enforcement risk when Artificial Intelligence is used to carry out mail fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, money laundering, or impersonation of federal officials. The draft would double the existing maximum fine for mail and wire fraud affecting a financial institution, regardless of whether Artificial Intelligence was used. It would also add Artificial Intelligence-specific penalty provisions for mail fraud, wire fraud, bank fraud, and money laundering, reinforcing Artificial Intelligence-enabled fraud as a distinct enforcement priority.
Workforce and cybersecurity provisions could reach a broader set of companies. One proposed change to the WARN Act would require additional disclosures when Artificial Intelligence is a substantial factor in a qualifying mass layoff, including disclosures about the use and impact of Artificial Intelligence. The cybersecurity provisions would reauthorize the Cybersecurity Act of 2015 through 2035 and authorize the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to award grants to eligible maintainers of designated critical open-source software. For most companies, the practical priority remains governance: mapping Artificial Intelligence use, auditing external claims, tightening vendor agreements, and maintaining controls that show who is accountable for business decisions.
