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Anthropic Quietly Pitches Congress a Draft AI Safety Bill, Politico Reports

Bot Mutiny | October 21, 2026

Anthropic representatives have quietly pitched Capitol Hill lawmakers on a draft bill to regulate frontier AI safety and security, Politico reported on October 16, 2026, citing three people with knowledge of the effort who were granted anonymity. Politico said it obtained the confidential draft, which it described as "not previously reported." TechCrunch followed on October 20.

An Anthropic spokesperson confirmed the draft, according to TechCrunch, and gave Politico a statement. "This bill represents the proposals outlined in Anthropic's Advanced AI Framework, which we have been advocating for with federal and state lawmakers since June," the spokesperson said. "These are sensible policies we believe Congress should act on."

What the draft would do

According to Politico, the bill would let the government block a model's release or use only if the model poses a foreseeable, imminent risk of more than $1 billion in damages, or of killing or seriously injuring more than 50 people. The risk must stem from "the creation or release of a biological weapon, the model evading its developer's controls or a cyberattack," Politico wrote. The language mirrors California's AI laws, including SB 53, Politico said.

The draft would rely on independent evaluators who register with the Commerce Department and periodically evaluate a lab and its frontier models. Politico reported that the labs themselves may pay the evaluators, so long as the payment "is not contingent on the evaluations' results." If evaluators find an "imminent enumerated risk," they must report it to Commerce within 72 hours of completing their assessment.

Commerce could then ask a federal judge to halt a model's release. Politico reported that the language "explicitly prohibits any other U.S. 'department, agency, or officer'" from suspending a model's development, deployment or internal use, and that a judge for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia could order a suspension.

Preemption and other provisions

The bill would also preempt some state AI laws on public disclosure of risk, third-party evaluation and reporting of critical incidents, according to Politico. It would require frontier labs to create safety frameworks, publish transparency reports for new frontier models, protect whistleblowers and report critical safety incidents to Commerce.

Politico noted that preemption has been a political flashpoint in Congress, with Democrats rejecting some proposals out of concern that they would weaken laws passed in California, Illinois and New York. It also reported that Anthropic has backed some state AI safety laws, including two in California, and that its head of U.S. state and local government relations previously told Politico that the company hopes states will continue to pass ever-stronger AI safety laws that raise the standard nationwide.

Context from the reporting

Politico wrote that leading AI labs disclosed a series of incidents this summer in which AI agents hacked or probed websites and platforms, and that none reported so far appear to have caused widespread deaths or more than $1 billion in damages. It also reported that Anthropic was subject to sweeping export controls over the summer that shut down two of its most advanced models, a decision made "in a whirlwind series of phone calls between administration officials and the company's executives," which worried some in the tech industry about access to their technology being restricted at the whim of government officials.

TechCrunch raised questions about the draft. "It's not clear how this proposed system would ensure that payments couldn't influence the evaluation," it wrote. It also said "[t]he theoretical risks offered in the draft policy are a little bit far afield from the kinds of incidents that have been top of mind for the tech industry of late," pointing to concern about agentic hacking. TechCrunch said Anthropic did not immediately respond to its request for comment.

Where it stands in Congress

Politico reported that the House bill known as the FRONTIER Act, led by Reps. Lori Trahan and Jay Obernolte, would give the government the ability to stop the deployment of risky models and preempt some state AI laws. In the Senate, Majority Leader John Thune and Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Ted Cruz have been negotiating an AI safety bill, which Politico said has faced headwinds from some safety-minded groups and from Sen. Maria Cantwell, who want the government to have a larger role in reviewing AI models.

Politico's report does not say which lawmakers were pitched or whether there are plans to introduce Anthropic's draft.