Last Friday, U.S. Congressman Josh Gottheimer announced a sweeping bipartisan push to impose stricter guardrails on artificial intelligence development and deployment.
Gottheimer, who represents New Jersey’s 5th Congressional District, made the announcement at Fairleigh Dickinson University in Teaneck, New Jersey.
The congressman serves as Co-Chair of the House AI Commission and as a senior member of the House Intelligence Committee.
The two bills — the American AI Security Act and the China FIREWALL Act — target both domestic AI vulnerabilities and foreign threats from Chinese-developed technology.
The American AI Security Act would require mandatory national security reviews of the most powerful AI models before any new versions are publicly released.
Under that bill, the National Security Agency would be granted full access to evaluate whether a given model could be weaponized to launch cyberattacks or assist in building chemical, biological, or radiological weapons.
The China FIREWALL Act would ban all federal agencies from using Chinese-developed AI models and prohibit Chinese AI software from appearing on any government-issued devices.
The proposal expands on existing restrictions involving the Chinese AI model DeepSeek, which were included in the fiscal 2026 National Defense Authorization Act.
Gottheimer made clear that the legislation is about safety, not obstruction, stating, “This isn’t about stopping AI or stifling innovation, it is about making sure — with warning signs flashing red — that we can safely deploy AI, and win the race the right way.”
He argued that the current absence of pre-deployment testing requirements represents a serious and unacceptable gap in U.S. policy.
“Right now, there are no mandatory requirements for pre-deployment testing of frontier AI models,” Gottheimer said, adding that such a standard “doesn’t work in banking, it doesn’t work in food safety, it doesn’t work in medicine.”
Gottheimer also announced he is sending a letter to National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross, pressing the administration on its AI cybersecurity clearinghouse and its readiness to handle AI-driven threats.
He questioned whether existing infrastructure is equipped for modern dangers, saying, “My letter asks the hard question: is this clearinghouse actually built for the threat we’re facing in 2026, or the threat we were facing two years ago?”
Gottheimer raised concerns about autonomous AI agents, warning that “swarms of AI agents operating at machine speed, coordinating attacks faster than any human can respond” represent a growing and underaddressed risk.
He also argued that the AI supply chain itself should be treated as critical infrastructure, comparing it to the power grid and water systems in terms of its importance to national security.
Gottheimer noted his broader legislative record, stating, “This Congress alone, I’ve led more than a dozen bipartisan bills that put up immediate guardrails to keep pace with the rapid rise of AI.”
The congressman called on House leadership to reconvene Congress before the election specifically to consider the AI safety legislation he unveiled on Friday.
