Thom Tillis says industry should self-regulate first and Congress could then codify it
Thom TillisRetiring United States senator speaking to reporters
Tillis said industry should first organise its own regulation and enforcement, and that Congress could then codify some of those rules.
“I think the industry needs to get a kind of Manhattan Project going, figure out what they need to do to self-regulate, and then what they need in order to enable them to have a consequence if people fall outside of those regulations. … We could codify some of them,”
Reporting
Where this statement fits
Should Washington impose stronger safeguards on frontier AI?
Washington's frontier-AI safeguards dispute continued beyond September's calls for legislation. On September 29, Trump and six companies signed an accord covering internal controls, outside evaluations and board oversight, with possible later codification. Trump defended self-regulation and existing federal powers. Critics including Jon Stewart and Tom Wheeler argue that company-led oversight is insufficient. An October 9 task-force statement describes reporting and remediation as mandatory, but does not specify enforcement mechanisms or penalties. The question remains whether Washington's approach supplies adequate, enforceable safeguards while allowing continued AI development.
Source and context
Reporting
About this source
Roll Call report posted 6:23pm on September 15, 2026 and updated at 9:36pm. Reports that neither party has coalesced around a legislative plan and that action before the midterms looks unlikely.
Before the quotation
Roll Call reports that Republicans have emphasised the need for industry involvement in any federal standard, and that Tillis pushed back on the hoax framing used by Trump.
After the quotation
Roll Call also reports that AI regulation was not discussed in depth at the Republican policy luncheon that day. The ellipsis inside the quotation is Roll Call's own, not an editorial cut.
How this statement is classified
The label describes this statement's response within the context above.
Why this label?
Tillis neither endorses nor rejects the case proposition. He pushes back on the hoax framing and allows that Congress could codify rules, while insisting the sequence must start with industry. That conditional support is why this is mixed rather than a defense or a rejection.
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The Dispute Index. "Thom Tillis says industry should self-regulate first and Congress could then codify it". First published: 2026-09-16. Last updated: 2026-09-16. https://disputeindex.com/events/730-tillis-said-industry-should-first-organise-its-own