The music industry has welcomed the news that a provision to stop US states from regulating AI - including via things like Tennessee’s ELVIS Act - has been removed from the big piece of legislation currently working its way through US Congress. When passed by the House Of Representatives in May, the controversial legislation that Donald Trump has named the One Big Beautiful Bill included a ten year “moratorium” - meaning a temporary suspension - of state-level AI regulation.
That “dangerous and unwise” AI provision “would have banned states from passing new legislation or enforcing existing laws” that regulate AI, the Human Artistry Campaign explains. That would include state-level regulations forcing transparency onto AI companies or measures like the ELVIS Act, which enables performers to stop nonconsensual deep-fakes and voice clones. The campaign says it “applauds” the removal of the moratorium from the big bill.
Ultimately 99 of the 100 Senators that make up the US Senate voted to remove the AI provision. “This final vote is a resounding dismissal of the shortsighted, zero-sum game thinking from some tech companies”, says Mitch Glazier, boss of the Recording Industry Association Of America. It also “signifies”, he adds, “a widespread recognition that respect for human creativity does not impede winning the AI race, but instead is essential to its success”.
Had the provision been included in the final version of the One Big Beautiful Bill, only Congress would have been able to introduce laws regulating AI in the US. Supporters of the provision argued that it’s more sensible to regulate AI at a US-wide federal level, and that forcing AI companies to navigate a patchwork of different regulations around the US would put them at a disadvantage in the global market-place, especially when competing with their rivals in China.
But critics of the provision saw it as an attempt by big tech to force all regulation to Washington, where they have more lobbying power, allowing them to reduce the extent to which they are regulated, or at least to slow down the introduction of any new AI laws.
For those seeking to tighten regulation of AI - whether on copyright grounds like the music industry or for other reasons - it’s useful to be able to push for new laws at both a state and federal level. Especially as law-making often happens faster at a state-level. Sometimes AI companies complying with the rules in one state might mean they end up complying across all of the US. Or, at least, the more quickly implemented state-level regulations can inform future federal law.
The ELVIS Act passed in Tennessee last year - allowing performers to protect their likeness and voice in the context of AI - is something of a prototype of the NO FAKES Act that has been proposed in Congress, but which is still being discussed in Washington. The music industry has been a big supporter of both acts.
Tennessee senator Marsha Blackburn co-sponsored the amendment to the One Big Beautiful Bill that removed the AI provision. Speaking about that provision last month, she said, “Tennessee passed the ELVIS Act, which is like our first generation of the NO FAKES Act and we certainly know that in Tennessee we need those protections”. She then added, “until we pass something that is federally preemptive, we can’t call for a moratorium on those things”.
Both the Human Artistry Campaign and the RIAA have thanked Blackburn and the amendment’s co-sponsor Maria Cantwell for getting the AI provision removed from the One Big Beautiful Bill as it passed through the Senate.
“We applaud Senators Blackburn and Cantwell for their persistent leadership to protect artists and rightsholders”, Glazier says, adding “federal and state governments both have a critical role to play in protecting creators while promoting AI innovation”.
Meanwhile the Human Artistry Campaign says it is “grateful to Senators Blackburn and Cantwell for their steadfast support and applauds the Senate’s resounding rejection of AI without guardrails”.