Labor leaders warn Congress that AI must serve workers, not billionaires

AFT President Randi Weingarten joined Sen. Bernie Sanders and a slate of labor leaders on Capitol Hill last week to deliver a blunt warning about unregulated artificial intelligence: If the Trump administration continues to let tech companies make decisions alone, working people-and our children-will pay the price.

"This is the most fundamental change that has happened in society, certainly in my lifetime, and maybe in all of history," Weingarten said. "When you have this kind of fundamental change, you would think that the greatest country in the world would stop and say: What do we do about this?"

The question of who gets to decide how the United States is managing AI implementation was at the center of the event. Each speaker agreed that the issue is too large, too disruptive and too consequential to be left to billionaires, individual employers or piecemeal contract fights.

Labor leaders have spent years trying to push policymakers to confront the dangers of unregulated technology, from social media to AI, Weingarten said, only to be met with delay and inaction. In the case of AI implementation, Congress and the Trump administration have refused to establish clear national guardrails and the administration has even gone so far as to block states from imposing their own-a decision that benefits billionaires and leaves workers to fight for their jobs.

"Why should we be doing this contract by contract, when this is a national seismic issue of every proportion?" she asked.

Rather than giving tech companies free rein, Weingarten said, lawmakers should be asking what kind of society people want and how new technology should serve the public good.

Because this is not just about jobs, she said. She distilled the issue to one sentence: "We need to make sure that the human being-the human being-is in charge of society, not a robot, and not a chatbot."

She referred to Melania Trump's appearance with a robot and noted that while technology can be helpful as a tool, it can never replace the human skills and knowledge needed to solve very human problems.

The message resonated with the broader labor coalition, which is defining AI as a worker issue, not just a tech issue. In addition to Sanders and Weingarten, speakers included AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler, United Auto Workers President Shawn Fain, National Education Association President Becky Pringle, Association of Flight Attendants President Sara Nelson and National Nurses United co-President Jamie Brown.

Sanders opened the event by calling for a moratorium on data centers, saying the country should slow the pace of AI expansion until there is a real plan for workers and communities. Shuler warned that the race to deploy AI "at all costs" is "reckless and dangerous," and pointed out that "workers were the ones who made every industrial revolution safe." Fain agreed that "AI will either work for the working class, or it will not work at all," and Nelson declared that "we're not going to take one step forward until regulation is in place."

That, more than anything, was the labor leaders' main message: AI is here, its effects are already being felt, and the choice is not whether change is coming but whether working people will be at the table or on the menu.

"Ultimately, what we're trying to do here is a call to action," Weingarten said. "We need this administration to actually put people first. We need sanity, common sense and dignity in the transition to AI."

Read more:

• "Commonsense Guardrails for Using Advanced Technology in Schools"
• The AFT's National Academy for AI Instruction

[Melanie Boyer]