WASHINGTON (THE WASHINGTON POST) – When Senators Christopher A Coons (D-Del) and Thom Tillis (R-NC) held a hearing on how artificial intelligence will impact patent law in June, they kicked off the session on an unusual note.
“If you’re under the age of 35 out there, would you raise your hand right now?” Tillis, the ranking Republican of the Senate’s intellectual property panel, asked those in attendance.
The response – where seemingly a majority of the audience threw up their hands – drew gasps from lawmakers and Senate staffers. “Wow,” said Coons, the panel’s chair.
“Even this old guy is interested in this subject, but I thank you all for being here,” Tillis quipped.
It marked one of at least four recent Senate hearings on AI that was packed with young people, a relatively rare sight for the chamber’s subcommittee sessions, which are often sleepy affairs.
The latest, a Senate Judiciary subcommittee hearing on Tuesday that focused on “principles for regulation” of AI, had a long line out the door – which seemed to be almost entirely composed of 20-somethings – before lawmakers even arrived.
“The audience was around the corner and I’ve never seen that many people waiting to get into a Judiciary Committee hearing, or a committee hearing in general,” Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn), whose privacy subcommittee held the session, told me afterward.
Several lawmakers attributed the high level of interest among young people to the sessions’ shared topic, AI, which has suddenly become one of the most talked about policy topics in Washington after years away from the limelight as a niche issue.
“It seems especially particular to AI, this kind of intense interest, and very productively so,” Blumenthal said. “I’m very excited and encouraged by it because we need these minds.”
Coons said in a statement: “It doesn’t surprise me that young people are deeply interested in artificial intelligence: generative AI has opened new avenues for innovation, creativity, and discovery. It also poses very real questions about intellectual property and the appropriate role for these tools in a 21st century economy.”
The Senate’s work on AI dialed up in earnest in May when OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, whose company is behind the popular ChatGPT tool, testified for the first time to a packed house. But the excitement over the topic has seemingly extended to lower-profile sessions.
“It is great to see a packed house. It demonstrates the intensity of interest in this subject,” Senator Jon Ossoff (D-Ga) said before kicking off a hearing on AI and human rights in June, which also appeared to be dominated by young attendees.
Coons’s and Tillis’s follow-up hearing on AI and copyright later in June was similarly well-attended.
Some of those testifying have also taken notice of the youthful uptick in AI interest.
“It’s great that young people are so interested in AI policy and how tech impacts their lives,” Alexandra Reeve Givens, CEO of the Centre for Democracy and Technology and a witness at Ossoff’s hearing, said in an email Tuesday. “AI impacts young people applying for jobs, looking for housing, seeking credit – as well as their daily experience in schools.”
Givens said some of those in attendance were some of her group’s own interns, but she said she’s noticed growing interest in the topic beyond the Senate. “It’s not just Congress – during the vice president’s AI meeting with public interest leaders this month, Encode Justice, a youth organising group, was there alongside CDT” and other groups, she said.
It’s unclear how much of the participation can be directly attributed to the topic over other factors, including the fact that Washington and Capitol Hill are typically flooded with interns during the summer.
Some of those in attendance at the sessions identified themselves to The Technology 202 as congressional interns and said they attended out of a particular interest in AI. Others said they noticed similarly high levels of attendance at other, unrelated subcommittee sessions.
Still, some lawmakers are hoping to ride the outside enthusiasm as they look to get their colleagues more engaged in crafting AI legislation.
“I’m just very excited that there’s that level of interest, because it shows something about our country. They want to be a part of this revolutionary movement,” Blumenthal said.
