Sanders Convenes Chinese and American Computer Scientists to Warn of Threat from AI
'The richest, most powerful people in the world are now building a runaway train with no brakes,' Sanders said.
WASHINGTON, April 29, 2026 — Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, on Wednesday convened leading artificial intelligence researchers from the United States and, via the Internet, China for a rare cross-border discussion warning that the unchecked development of AI poses an existential risk to humanity – and that governments have failed to respond with appropriate urgency.
The roughly 75-minute panel, livestreamed from the Capitol, featured Massachusetts Institute of Technology physicist Max Tegmark, University of Montreal AI researcher David Krueger, Beijing Institute of AI Safety and Governance Dean Zeng Yi, and Tsinghua University professor Xue Lan, who chairs China's national AI governance expert committee.
Sanders, a former candidate for the Democratic Party presidential nomination in 2016 and 2020, opened the event by citing Google DeepMind chief Demis Hassabis's projection that the AI revolution could be "10 times bigger than the industrial revolution and 10 times faster."
