Pfluger Introduces Bill to Make AI More Transparent and Attack-Resistant

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Congressman August Pfluger (TX-11) introduced the Reliable Artificial Intelligence Research Act (RAIRA) to stop bad actors from exploiting AI and strengthen American national security. This is first-of-its-kind legislation that creates federally funded research competitions to strengthen AI defenses and reveal how AI systems make decisions.

"As AI becomes more deeply woven into our economy and our national defense, we cannot afford to leave it vulnerable to those who would exploit it," Congressman August Pfluger said. "Adversaries are already looking for ways to manipulate these systems, and we must stay ahead of them. The Reliable Artificial Intelligence Research Act puts American ingenuity to work on making AI more transparent, more predictable, and more resistant to attacks." 

RAIRA would create two national competitions, run by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), that would reward advanced research in two core areas of AI security: AI interpretability and adversarial robustness. AI interpretability focuses on making AI decisions more transparent and predictable, while adversarial robustness seeks to strengthen AI systems against malicious manipulation. By investing $10 million in this program over the next five years, this legislation would provide some of the first significant federal funding dedicated to foundational AI security science, encouraging further innovation across the industry, universities, and independent researchers working on these issues.

RAIRA has received support from outside organizations, including Americans for Responsible Innovation. 

"AI models are being deployed into some of our country’s most vulnerable systems while we still do not fully understand how they arrive at their decisions," said Brad Carson, President of Americans for Responsible Innovation. "This means that a future incident could cause a devastating rippling effect throughout our agencies. By investing in new talent to broaden the field of assurance and interpretability research, this bill will help us get ahead of crises before they occur."

The legislation is a House companion to bipartisan legislation introduced by Senator Jim Banks (R-IN) and Senator Maggie Hassan (D-NH), developed in coordination with key technology industry stakeholders.