US senator calls for AI competition in Pentagon contracting
作者：By Marisa Taylor and Alexandra UlmerMay 28, 20253:07 PM UTCUpdated ago
FIL PHOTO: AI (Artificial Intelligence) letters are placed on computer motherboard in this illustration taken, June 23, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration/File Photo Purchase Licensing Rights, opens new tab
May 28 (Reuters) - Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren urged the U.S. Department of Defense to ensure competitive AI contracting, according to a letter seen by Reuters on Wednesday, as tech billionaire Elon Musk's artificial intelligence chatbot Grok gains ground in the federal government.
Warren's letter comes on the heels of Reuters reporting last week that Musk’s DOGE team is expanding use of Grok to analyze data, potentially violating conflict-of-interest laws and putting at risk sensitive information on millions of Americans.
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“I seek to ensure that the DoD’s procurement decisions encourage competition and avoid consolidation that can lead to higher prices, concentration of risk, and the stifling of innovation,” Warren, a senior member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, wrote in the letter to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth on Wednesday.
Warren asked the Pentagon to respond to her by June 9 on its AI acquisition practices, how it plans to avoid getting locked in with a particular contractor, and its safeguards for data collection.
“How does DoD plan to ensure government data is not used to illegally train commercially available AI algorithms?” Warren wrote.
The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The letter did not mention Grok, which was developed by xAI, or its competitors, which include OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Anthropic’s Claude.
In a meeting first reported by Reuters, Hegseth met Musk and members of the xAI team at the Pentagon on May 21, officials said, the second known time the close ally of President Donald Trump has visited the department's headquarters.
The White House’s Office of Management and Budget released
new guidance, opens new tabin April directing federal agencies to ensure that the government and “the public benefit from a competitive American AI marketplace.” The guidance, however, exempted national security and defense systems.
Warren of Massachusetts and Senator Eric Schmitt, a Republican senator for Missouri who also serves on the Armed Services Committee, recently reintroduced a bill that includes provisions that would also encourage AI competition in the Defense Department.
The Department of Defense, with a budget approaching $1 trillion per year, accounted for
over half of the federal government’s contracting dollars in the fiscal year 2023, opens new tab, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.
Reporting by Marisa Taylor and Alexandra Ulmer; Editing by Mark Porter
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Marisa Taylor, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter, has more than two decades of experience covering business, healthcare, the Justice Department, and national security. As a Washington, D.C.-based reporter, she helped break the Panama Papers, which exposed offshore companies linked to more than 140 politicians. Taylor was also part of a team that exposed the CIA’s monitoring of Senate Intelligence Committee staff. She previously reported out of Texas, California, Virginia and Mexico. https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/staff-reuters https://www.reuters.com/authors/marisa-taylor/
Alexandra covers the 2024 U.S. presidential race, with a focus on Republicans, donors and AI. Previously, she spent four years in Venezuela reporting on the humanitarian crisis and investigating corruption. She has also worked in India, Chile and Argentina. Alexandra was Reuters' Reporter of the Year and has won an Overseas Press Club award.
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