Obama slams Trump over AI policy, reminds him how threats in other industries are regulated

WASHINGTON, DC: The intense pace of the Artificial Intelligence (AI) boom entered the political playground after a warning surfaced that if it isn't restrained, the technology can pose an existential threat to humanity.

Now, former President Barack Obama has also spoken up about the threat and lectured the federal government on how companies are regulated to prevent them from harming people or violating rights.

Obama says market alone can't ensure AI safety

After Trump’s main advisers argued that the market will take care of the safety risks posed by AI, Barack Obama ripped the Trump administration, teaching them that’s not how potential threats from industries are averted.

Obama went off on Trump’s approach to AI during a Friday, September 18, interview at Colgate University, claiming that while he believed it is “remarkable technology,” AI could go off the rails and cause serious “mischief” if politicians don’t put guardrails in place.

"I heard one of Donald Trump’s main advisers on this make the argument that, 'The market will take care of AI. These companies will solve the safety issues because they have every incentive to do so — if it turns out to be dangerous, people will just sue them,'" the former president said.

“That’s not how we treat airlines,” Obama added. “Or d**g companies, or food companies.”

Obama warned that technology could become a threat at a human level if it lands in the hands of “bad humans.”

Notably, the radical group in Yemen, the Houthis, used a model of Claude to assist in developing software for guided weapons.

Media reports claimed that a cell in northern Yemen was running three weapons programs. To achieve their objective, users employed Claude Code to act like human software engineers, writing code, running simulations, and troubleshooting technical issues.

Obama also warned that if the tech, which has the ability to improve its upcoming models, realizes that it doesn’t need humans, it could prove disastrous for its developers.

Obama encourages 'voluntary industry restraint' before Congress gets serious

Taking aim at Trump’s remarks that regulation on AI is “for losers,” Obama said that things are going out of hand and the current administration is inefficient at putting together “regulatory frameworks.”

“So we’ve got a gap of at least a couple of years where things are moving really fast, and we have an administration that is not capable of or willing to — I would argue both — putting together a serious regulatory framework,” Obama said.

He emphasized “encouraging some sort of voluntary industry restraint” as the “best we can do now” until both the legislative and executive branches “start getting serious about this.”

Previously, several reports suggested that Barack Obama advised Democrats to keep AI at the heart of the agendas to discuss and debate in future.

He urged House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) to make AI oversight a central tenet of his caucus’s agenda.

The New York Times reported that Jeffries was advised to focus on AI as an issue if midterms result favours Democrats.