As reports surface about efforts to establish a federal moratorium that would limit state-level regulation of artificial intelligence in year-end defense legislation, funding legislation, or by executive order, the Directors Guild of America today released the following statement:
The Directors Guild of America joins with other creative rights advocates, law enforcement officials, lawmakers, and online victim prevention professionals to strongly oppose efforts within Congress and the White House to prohibit or penalize states for protecting their citizens from AI-enabled harm – including state efforts to combat child exploitation, individual privacy violations, fraud and abuse, deepfakes, intellectual property theft, anticompetitive practices, and other violations of consumer protection and the public’s trust.
Until Congress and the President enact a comprehensive federal framework for AI, a moratorium leaves us all vulnerable to the extractive, profit-at-all-costs lawlessness of the dominant AI developers. Washington should be working with the states, not against them, to create AI protections for all American citizens. We should avoid repeating the mistakes of the 1990s when lawmakers sacrificed meaningful digital accountability in the name of “innovation”.
Beyond fighting for creative rights in the AI age, the DGA calls on Washington to put the safety of the American people ahead of Big Tech and reject their self-serving pleas for a federal moratorium.
