Senate Parliamentarian Rules in Favor of AI Moratorium
State ban now faces political test
Cameron Marx
WASHINGTON, June 23, 2025 – The Senate Parliamentarian ruled that a proposed 10 year ban on the state regulation of artificial intelligence passed procedural muster, clearing the way for the ban to be included in the reconciliation bill sent to the Senate.
The ruling, announced Saturday, affirmed that the 10 year moratorium met Senate budgetary rules, including the Byrd Rule, which stipulates that only fiscally related provisions can be included in reconciliation packages. To comply with the Byrd Rule, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, added a provision to the ban that would rescind Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program funds from states that attempted to regulate AI.
Some Republicans, including fellow Texan Sen. John Cornyn, expressed doubt that the measure would pass, even with it being tied to BEAD funding.
Had the parliamentarian ruled against the moratorium’s inclusion, the ban would have needed 60 votes to break a Senate filibuster. With the parliamentarian’s ruling, the provision now needs a simple majority to pass.
With its procedural test passed, the moratorium now faces a political one. Several Republican lawmakers, including Sens. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., Ron Johnson, R-Wis., and Josh Hawley, R-Mo., have expressed concerns about the ban, while House members such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., have said that they are, “100 percent opposed” to the provision. Several Democratic lawmakers have also voiced their opposition to the legislation, arguing that “linking critical broadband funding – intended to close the digital divide, support rural communities, and provide lifesaving services to our constituents – to the suppression of state-level AI oversight is both coercive and irresponsible.”
Other Republicans, such as Rep. Jay Obernolte, R-Calif., and Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, have expressed support for the provision, with Moreno arguing that “AI doesn’t understand state borders, so it is extraordinarily important for the federal government to be the one that sets interstate commerce. It’s in our Constitution. You can’t have a patchwork of 50 states.”
Assuming that all Democrats vote against the reconciliation package, Republicans can only afford three defections in the Senate and three in the House to get the legislation passed.
