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White House orders federal agencies to name chief AI officers
The White House is ordering all federal agencies to name chief artificial intelligence officers to oversee the federal government’s various approaches to AI and manage the risks that the rapidly evolving technologies might pose.
That directive is part of a government-wide policy from the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, or OMB, that Vice President Kamala Harris announced Thursday, following a sweeping AI executive order President Biden signed in October. The White House is trying to push the federal government — known more for its slow-moving bureaucracy than its ability to adopt cutting-edge technology — to keep up with the changes in the field of artificial intelligence.
“We have directed all federal agencies to designate a chief AI officer with the experience, expertise, and authority to oversee all — I’m going to emphasize that — all AI technologies used by that agency,” Harris said Wednesday in embargoed remarks on the new policy. “And this is to make sure that AI is used responsibly, understanding that we must have senior leaders across our government who are specifically tasked with overseeing AI adoption and use.”
The new OMB policy also requires federal agencies to establish AI governance boards to coordinate and establish rules for the use of AI technologies across each agency. The White House says the departments of Defense, Housing and Urban Development, State and Veterans Affairs have already set up governance boards. The Biden administration plans to hire 100 AI professionals across agencies by this summer.
By December, federal agencies must also put in place what the White House calls “concrete safeguards” when they use AI “in a way that could impact Americans’ rights or safety.”
For example, Harris said Wednesday, if the VA wants to use AI in VA hospitals to help diagnose patients, the department would first need to demonstrate the AI doesn’t produce “racially biased diagnoses.”
The White House will also be requiring federal agencies to post a list of their AI systems online, along with an assessment of the risks those systems might pose and how they plan to manage them, Harris said. That list will need to be published and updated each year.
“President Biden and I intend that these domestic policies will serve as a model for global action,” Harris said.
Overseeing the federal government’s adoption of AI technologies is one of the many hats Harris has been given as vice president. She delivered a major policy speech in London in November on the U.S. government’s vision for the future of AI.
AI has at times become a problem for Mr. Biden personally. AI was used to impersonate the president in fake robocalls that went out to New Hampshire voters, and fake and manipulated videos of the president have emerged online.
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Rep. Mike Turner says all “candidates need to deescalate” after Trump assassination attempts
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Sen. Mark Kelly says feds need to do a “better job” of letting Americans know “there’s a huge amount of misinformation” on election
Washington — Sen. Mark Kelly said Sunday that the federal government needs to do its part to inform Americans of the vast swath of election misinformation that’s being consumed on social media platforms like X, TikTok, Facebook and Instagram.
“It’s up to us, the people who serve in Congress and in the White House to get the information out there, that there is a tremendous amount of misinformation in this election, and it’s not going to stop on Nov. 5,” Kelly said on “Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan.”
Kelly, who sits on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said he’s seen these misinformation operations target not only his state of Arizona, but also other battleground states.
“There is a very reasonable chance I would put it in the 20 to 30% range, that the content you are seeing, the comments you are seeing, are coming from one of those three countries: Russia, Iran, China,” Kelly said.
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In a committee hearing last month on foreign threats to the 2024 election, Kelly presented screenshots of Russian-made web pages showing fabricated headlines designed to look like Fox News and The Washington Post, targeted at voters in battleground states.
“So my constituents in Arizona and others — they seek to influence the outcome of these elections, and that is absolutely beyond the pale,” Kelly said at the Sept. 18 hearing. “We’ve got to do something about it.”
Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump each have the support of 49% of Arizona voters, according to CBS News’ battleground tracker as of Sept. 30.
In another battleground state, Pennsylvania, Trump returned Saturday to hold a rally in Butler three months after an attempted assassination on him. He was joined by members of his own party and billionaire Elon Musk, who said Trump was the only way to preserve democracy and warned of a last election if he does not win in November.
Speaking to CNN’s State of the Union on Sunday, Kelly called the social media mogul a hypocrite.
“He’s standing next to the guy that tried to overturn the 2020 election on Jan. 6, saying that this is somehow going to be the last election and they’re going to take away your vote,” Kelly said. “And you know, it just doesn’t pass the logic test.”
At the White House press briefing on Friday, President Biden – speaking from the podium for the first time since taking office – said he’s confident of a free and fair election but alluded to the 2021 insurrection at the Capitol in his concerns on whether it will be a peaceful transfer of power.
“The things that Trump has said and the things that he said last time out when he didn’t like the outcome of the election were very dangerous,” Mr. Biden said. “If you notice, I noticed that the vice-presidential Republican candidate did not say he’d accept the outcome of the election, and they haven’t even accepted the outcome of the last election.”
