- OpenAI and Anthropic are accelerating lobbying efforts in Washington at an unprecedented scale to directly influence US AI legislation.
- OpenAI has just opened its first lobbying office near the White House named “Workshop,” which functions as a combined lab and AI showroom for working with lawmakers.
- OpenAI spent $1 million on federal lobbying in the first quarter of 2026, doubling the amount from the same period last year.
- Meanwhile, Anthropic increased its lobbying expenditure tenfold to $3 million over the past year and hired six additional lobbying firms.
- According to the organization Public Citizen, about 25% of the 13,000 lobbyists in Washington are currently involved in AI-related issues, a sharp increase from 11% in 2023.
- Meta, NVIDIA, and Alphabet spent a combined total of $47.8 million on federal lobbying in 2025, a 22% increase compared to the previous year.
- AI companies want to limit regulatory oversight, arguing that overly strict controls will cause the US to lose to China in the global AI race.
- However, Anthropic is pushing for stronger AI safety laws after its Mythos model raised concerns regarding security vulnerability detection and cyberattack assistance.
- The Donald Trump administration is currently reported to be considering increased oversight of frontier AI models instead of letting companies “develop freely.”
- Parents’ groups and civil organizations are increasingly concerned about the impact of AI chatbots on children, particularly following multiple suicides linked to AI interactions.
- An NBC News survey shows that 57% of US voters believe AI risks outweigh its benefits, while only 34% think otherwise.
- Anthropic is currently in regular communication with the White House regarding the potential issuance of an executive order to test AI models before widespread deployment.
- The article demonstrates that AI is no longer a purely technological game, but has become a political, legal, and national security battle in the US.
- 📌 Conclusion: AI companies are plunging into a policy-influence race that is just as intense as the model capability race. OpenAI, Anthropic, and Big Tech understand that upcoming AI laws could decide who controls global AI infrastructure, data, and compute for years to come. Washington has now become the new “AI battlefield,” where companies seek to both avoid tightening regulations and shape rules of the game that favor the US AI ecosystem under competitive pressure from China.
