GoKawiilArtificial intelligence has rocketed to the front of next Tuesday's Massachusetts Senate Democratic primary, as Rep. Seth Moulton tries to unseat Bay State political titan Sen. Ed Markey.
Moulton, a six-term House member, has capitalized on a fumbling answer from Markey during a recent debate where the senator said he did not know whether he used AI on his personal electronic devices. Moulton said Markey's answer is "why we need a new generation of leaders" and has turned the answer into advertising.
But Markey, who is seeking a third full term in the Senate and has represented Massachusetts in Congress for nearly half a century, has the backing of one of AI's most crucial players: Anthropic. Federal Election Commission filings show the Anthropic-backed nonprofit Public First Action, which operates several political action committees, donated $500,000 to Commonwealth Together, a PAC that supports Markey.
Anthony Rivera-Rodriguez, a spokesperson for Public First Action, said it is supporting Markey because he "has been unequivocal in his support for regulating AI."
"In Congress he helped lead the 99 to 1 vote that stripped a moratorium on state AI regulation out of reconciliation. He has worked to beat back every version of preemption that has come back since, and he wrote legislation to stop the administration from stripping states of their regulatory authority," Rivera-Rodriguez said.
The fight over AI and its associated data center infrastructure has spilled into election-after-election this year, and the companies behind AI have emerged as some of this election's biggest spenders. Corporate money has poured into both sides of the Massachusetts primary, with Advance Progress, a PAC supportive of Moulton, bankrolled by major financial players like former Bain Capital co-chair Josh Bekenstein.