2026-09-30T09:00:29.366Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/30/politics/barack-obama-shaping-democrats-ai-debate
是的，那些与巴拉克·奥巴马交谈过的潜在2028年民主党总统候选人都表示，每当他询问他们有关人工智能的问题时，他们都会认真对待并着手制定相关计划。
奥巴马认为，目前他们所拿出的方案远远不够——无论是应对这一问题的规模，还是处理相关政治议题。他也向候选人直言不讳地指出了这一点。
这位前总统并非孤军奋战：从联邦贸易委员会前主席莉娜·汗到前商务部长吉娜·雷蒙多，各派系的民主党领导人都在要求日益团结的候选人阵营拿出更多举措，他们表示，目前大部分候选人的回应都过于被动，未能顺应时代需求。但包括奥巴马在内的所有人，目前尚未就具体方案达成一致，部分2028年总统竞选 hopefuls 还担心自己会站在人工智能行业巨额竞选资金支持的对立面。
尽管已离开白宫十年，奥巴马仍是民主党公认的标杆人物，他经常与新一代民主党领导人保持联系——无论是他们主动寻求建议，还是他致电祝贺他们竞选获胜。据知情人士透露，在加州之行、华盛顿办公室会谈以及电话沟通中，奥巴马还与各大人工智能公司的负责人进行了交流，包括OpenAI的萨姆·奥尔特曼、谷歌和Anthropic的高管，同时也听取了众多外部专家、学者以及包括前推特高管杰森·古德曼在内的非正式顾问的意见，古德曼曾负责奥巴马的数字战略办公室。
他深入研读相关材料，尤其青睐埃兹拉·克莱因、德里克·汤普森、查理·沃泽尔和凯西·牛顿的文章，并在人工智能创始人向他取经、请教如何应对华盛顿政坛，以及新一代政坛新秀向他咨询如何把握政策方向时，扮演着非正式桥梁的角色。
当地时间周二，唐纳德·特朗普总统在白宫会见了多位人工智能行业领袖，称他们已签署一项新承诺，旨在更好地“自我监管”各自公司的人工智能模型。（特朗普还表示，他很快将签署一项行政命令，将“人工智能”更名为“超级智能”。）华盛顿的大多数共和党人都紧跟他的立场，反对对人工智能实施广泛的联邦监管。
与此同时，关注2028年大选的民主党人纷纷发表演讲、成立委员会、推出计划——多名民主党幕僚坦言，这些不过是初步尝试，旨在表明他们正在采取行动。但他们大多仍不了解这项技术的当前发展状况，也不清楚两年内可能发生的变革幅度。
多位潜在候选人的顾问私下向CNN承认，他们目前避免采取任何可能被贴上标签的行动——他们陷入两难境地：要么显得过于依附企业，要么过于激进，要么不够亲民，要么监管过度。他们也意识到，公开表态可能会让这些企业资助的超级政治行动委员会在竞争激烈的初选中针对他们。
奥巴马并未提及人类灭绝的威胁，而是更关注人工智能带来的失业、国家安全以及虚假信息泛滥对儿童造成的影响。据多位知情人士透露，数月前——远早于近期人工智能高管们纷纷发出警告——他就曾对所有前来拜访或仅通过电话道贺的民主党人表示，无论从政策还是政治角度出发，他们都需要明确的应对方案。
“鉴于我们可能面临的大规模 disruption，奥巴马总统认为，围绕这项技术的开发和应用展开务实且知情的讨论至关重要，”他的高级顾问埃里克·舒尔茨对CNN表示，“其对我们经济和民主的影响将取决于我们的选择。这意味着既要认识到人工智能带来的巨大机遇，也要清醒地看待风险，并找到最佳的应对措施。”
十余年来，奥巴马对人工智能的态度已从某次采访中的玩笑——“当你看到它即将成真时，就得把电源拔掉”——转变为对国家尚未做好应对其后果准备的严峻看法。
本月早些时候，在科尔盖特大学的一次活动中，他表示：“在治愈癌症或开发更优质能源方面，我们无需依赖自主人工智能，也无需让其在互联网上肆意传播。人们之所以这么做，是因为需要向市场推出用户愿意付费的产品。”
奥巴马在多次与他人的交谈中（这些交谈内容已转达给CNN）表示，即便他认为美国有一个称职的政府执政，人工智能的崛起及其未来影响依然极具挑战性。而他对特朗普几乎没有信心——特朗普上周在联合国宣布更愿意将其称为“超级智能”，并于周二会见了多位人工智能创始人，坚持奉行自由放任政策——奥巴马补充道，这让情况变得更加棘手。
奥巴马自白宫时期就对技术变革抱有兴趣，2023年他被总统乔·拜登任命为人工智能事务非正式特使后，更是在相关工作基础上继续推进。他表示，希望建立一套“严肃的监管框架”，效仿联邦政府为食品或航空业制定标准的模式。但奥巴马并未提出具体计划，也没有要求2028年的竞选候选人必须签署。
多位潜在总统候选人的顾问向CNN透露，他们看到民调显示民众对数据中心和社交媒体的反对声浪日益高涨，一些人通过私下交流开始相信，目前已经出现了比公开披露的更严重的问题——比如人工智能代理在互联网上被秘密植入。但他们也承认，如果过于直言不讳，担心会遭到资金雄厚的势力打压。
根据AdImpact的数据，与人工智能行业相关的外部团体已在2026年选举的攻防广告上投入了近5000万美元。联邦选举委员会的记录显示，领先的人工智能政治行动委员会和非营利组织筹集的资金更多，Anthropic和OpenAI关联的团体在本选举周期迄今已筹集超过1.5亿美元。
亚历克斯·博雷斯曾是Palantir员工，在纽约州议会任职期间支持多项人工智能监管州级法案。今年春季，人工智能关联的政治行动委员会为支持和反对他花费了数千万美元，导致曼哈顿一个开放国会席位的初选成为历史上耗资最巨的选举之一。
他表示，自己已与前副总统卡玛拉·哈里斯、前交通部长皮特·布蒂吉格、州长乔希·夏皮罗、州长JB·普利茨克、参议员马克·凯利、参议员鲁本·加列戈、参议员乔恩·奥索夫、众议员亚历山德里亚·奥卡西奥-科特兹和众议员罗·卡纳的团队会面时，竞选资金问题被频繁提及。
博雷斯发起了一个团体，旨在敦促2028年的候选人采取更明确的监管立场。他告诉CNN，政客和顾问们不断询问相关情况。
“‘你当时面对如此巨额的资金反对，是什么感受？’‘你怎么知道他们会针对你？’”博雷斯向CNN描述他们的提问方式，“他们或明或暗地在问：‘有没有什么雷区我可以避开？’‘我该如何在这场博弈中找准立场，既正确谈论人工智能，又不会招致对方投入巨额资金打压？’”
“一些胜算较小的候选人更愿意冒险，”博雷斯补充道，“总体而言，很多人仍在试图讨好所有人。”
但资金流向并非只有一个方向。例如，博雷斯遭到人工智能关联政治行动委员会花费850万美元的攻击，但同时也有2250万美元的资金用于支持他。不过，一位人工智能行业消息人士警告称，民主党如果采取过于激进的监管和末日论立场，可能会引发反弹，影响该党提名候选人对阵共和党人的选情，就像2024年大选时加密货币资金流向特朗普那样。
“引领未来政治行动委员会”的发言人杰西·亨特表示，该组织的主要资金来源是与OpenAI和安德森·霍洛维茨基金有过往或当前关联的人士，他们的核心关注点仍是创新。
“我们将继续支持那些希望在这一重要议题上达成共识、摒弃极端主义的领导人，”亨特对CNN说道。
汗和雷蒙多发出的警告
许多试图明确人工智能政策立场的民主党潜在候选人，也将莉娜·汗纳入了咨询名单。离开拜登政府后，汗已成为左翼乃至部分民粹主义右翼企业监管思潮的新核心。
汗对CNN表示，那些谈论政治行动委员会或“p(doom)”（估算人工智能终结人类可能性的术语）的政客们偏离了重点。美国人之所以对人工智能不满，是因为他们看到数据中心消耗电力导致水电价格上涨，或是聊天机器人让客服体验变得更糟，更不用说拒绝赔付医疗保险索赔了。
汗在交谈中表示，她一直在敦促潜在总统候选人记住，人工智能议题的背景是美国人比以往任何时候都更感到经济不稳定，而富人却越来越富有。
“还有一个基本问题：日复一日，这些人工智能高管们在解释他们的技术如何入侵其他公司、其他国家的政府。如果是普通人这么做，那会被视为非法，”她说，“如今这些公司及其尖端技术也在这么做，为什么这不违法？”
即便民主党已经推出了一些举措，“任何方案都很难显得可信，因为国会完全丧失了履职能力，行政部门彻底陷入腐败，法院也变得过于自由放任，”汗说，“因此，解决人工智能监管等严肃问题，也需要同时解决治理危机。”
而通常更注重商业立场的雷蒙多，通过她的新组织“RAISE US”推动了一种更全面的人工智能应对方案，重点是帮助劳动力向人工智能经济转型。
雷蒙多表示，她也与许多潜在总统候选人进行了交谈，但对他们目前的表态并不满意，认为大多数人的回应纯粹是对数据中心反对声或人工智能高管推特警告的被动反应。
“如果你想成为总统，你必须退后一步，想想：‘好吧，几年后美国会因为人工智能变成什么样？我该如何主动制定计划，确保我们既能保持创新，又能让每个美国工人在人工智能时代都拥有一份好工作，让所有人都能从中受益？’”雷蒙多对CNN说道，“当人们感到恐惧时，最糟糕的做法是试图让他们相信没有什么可担心的——最好的做法是诚实、坦诚、负责任，并让他们放心，你已经掌握了情况。”
当被问及是否有信心政治动态会带来人工智能所需的周全考虑和细节方案时，雷蒙多说：“我是个有信仰的人，”并补充道，“无论左右还是中间派的总统候选人都会意识到，这可能是最大的议题，仅仅被动回应是不够的。”
雷蒙多曾考虑过参加2028年总统竞选。她表示，目前已放弃这一打算，专注于当前的工作。
陷入“机器人末日论”与“金钱炸弹”的两难境地
普利茨克和加州州长加文·纽瑟姆都与多位人工智能行业领袖进行过交谈，并与夏皮罗和马里兰州州长韦斯·摩尔一起，在9月发布了新一轮州级行政命令，以应对这项技术。
不过，在联邦层面最积极参与人工智能政策讨论的潜在总统候选人是凯利。一年前，他发布了自己所谓的人工智能路线图，提议设立一项由人工智能公司出资的联邦基金，用于帮助支付更高的电费、投资基础设施和安全协议。
上周，凯利在参议院走廊上提出了一项旨在缓解未来劳动力 disruption 的新法案。他告诉CNN，他曾参加过9月份一位专家为参议员们举办的简报会，该专家警告称，这项技术的变革速度呈指数级增长。凯利补充道，作为军事委员会和情报委员会的成员，他每次开会都能获得大量信息，不仅了解美国国内的情况，还要努力跟上竞争对手的步伐，“天呐，每隔几个月就会出现新的情况。”
“我不认为我们正在走向某种机器人末日，就是那种《终结者》式的场景，”凯利说，“但我认为我们足够聪明，可以设置护栏，引导其朝着最终造福人类的方向发展——这就是我希望看到的。”
凯利表示，在构思自己的方案时，他曾与雷蒙多、前劳工统计局局长埃丽卡·麦肯塔弗、前代理劳工部长、现任纽约市副市长朱莉·苏以及美国教师联合会主席兰迪·温加滕等人交流过。奥巴马也向他提出过建议，但凯利说：“我其实并不认为我们一定需要这样，尤其是如果你关注世界上正在发生的事情的话。”
凯利补充道，他知道如果考虑参加2028年竞选，针对他的资金打压威胁依然存在，但“我们不应该因为担心有人会为了选举而投入巨额资金，就做出相应的决策。”
对其他民主党领导人来说，明确反对资本势力也是一个政治机遇。
“我们面临一个抉择：是对人工智能和加密货币保持沉默，希望他们不会花钱攻击我们？还是将他们的资金问题作为选举议题？”康涅狄格州参议员克里斯·墨菲说道，他也被视为潜在总统候选人，“如果我们讨好两个政治上不受欢迎、试图为所欲为的行业，那将是一个巨大的错误。所以我的观点是，如果我们大声谴责人工智能行业和加密货币行业试图收买我们的政治，这将是我们能做出的最安全的政治选择。”
CNN的大卫·赖特对本报道亦有贡献。
Exclusive: Barack Obama’s hidden hand shaping Democrats’ AI debate
2026-09-30T09:00:29.366Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/30/politics/barack-obama-shaping-democrats-ai-debate
Yes, the likely 2028 Democratic presidential candidates who’ve talked to Barack Obama keep saying when he asks them about AI, they’re paying attention and working up plans.
Obama doesn’t think what he’s seen so far is anywhere near enough — for addressing the scale of the issue, and for dealing with the politics. And he tells them that.
The former president isn’t alone: Democratic leaders across the spectrum, from former Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan to former Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, are also demanding more from a coalescing field they say so far has generally been more reactive than meeting the moment. But none of them — including Obama — can agree yet quite what the plan should be, and some 2028 hopefuls are worried about getting on the wrong side of the AI industry’s massive campaign spending.
Still his party’s standard-setter 10 years out of the White House, Obama is regularly in touch with the rising generation of Democratic leaders, from when they reach out for advice to when he calls to congratulate them on victories. But on trips to California, in his office in Washington and over the phone, Obama has also been talking with leaders of all the major artificial intelligence companies — including Sam Altman of OpenAI, as well as executives at Google and Anthropic — and a range of outside experts and academics along with informal advisers, including Jason Goldman, the former Twitter executive who ran his Office of Digital Strategy, according to people familiar with the conversations.
He’s deep into the reading, favoring articles by Ezra Klein, Derek Thompson, Charlie Warzel and Casey Newton, and serving as an informal bridge between AI founders updating him and asking advice for how to navigate Washington and the next generation of rising politicians turning to him as they feel through what to do.
President Donald Trump hosted several AI leaders at the White House on Tuesday, saying they had signed a new commitment aimed at better “self-policing” their companies’ AI models. (Trump also said he would soon sign an executive order renaming “artificial intelligence” as “super intelligence.”) Most Republicans in Washington have taken their cues from him, pushing back against broad federal regulation of AI.
Democrats eyeing 2028, meanwhile, have been releasing speeches and commissions and plans that — multiple party operatives concede — are fledging attempts to show they’re doing something. But they still largely don’t understand where the technology is now or how much it could change in two years.
Advisers to several potential candidates admit privately to CNN they’re so far avoiding doing much of anything they could get tagged with —caught between coming off too captive of the corporations or too combative, insufficiently populist or over-regulatory. They’re also cognizant that speaking out could make the companies’ massively funded super PACs target them in a crowded primary.
Obama doesn’t talk about humanity ending, staying more focused on the fallout in job displacement, national security and the effect especially on children from the mushrooming of disinformation. For months — long before the recent rash of warnings from AI executives — he has been telling every Democrat who comes to see him or who he’s been on the phone with even for congratulatory calls that they need to have a strong sense of what to do, for both policy and political reasons, according to multiple people familiar with the conversations.
“Given the scale of disruption we are likely to face, President Obama believes it’s important to have a grounded and informed conversation about how this technology is developed and introduced,” his senior adviser Eric Schultz told CNN. “Its effects on our economy and our democracy will depend on the choices we make. That means understanding the enormous opportunities AI presents while being clear-eyed about the risks and how best to mitigate them.”
Over 10 years, Obama has gone from joking in an interview about AI — “When you see it about to happen, you gotta yank that electricity out of the wall” — to a grim view of how unprepared the country is for the consequences of what is arriving.
Earlier this month during an appearance at Colgate University, he said, “in terms of how do we cure cancer or get better energy, you can do that without having agentic AI and having it just roaming free in the internet. The reason you are doing that is because you have to market a product that people will pay money for.”
The rise of artificial intelligence and its coming impact would still be really hard, Obama has said in multiple conversations relayed to CNN, even if he felt the country had a competent administration in charge. That he has little confidence in Trump — who last week announced at the United Nations he’d rather call it “super intelligence” and on Tuesday met with several AI founders himself as he keeps to a laissez-faire approach — Obama tends to add, makes it infinitely harder.
Interested in changing technology going back to his White House days and building on the work he did when tapped by President Joe Biden in 2023 to be the informal envoy to the AI world, Obama has said he wants what he calls “a serious regulatory framework” in line with how the federal government sets standards for food or airlines. But Obama doesn’t have a specific plan that he’s pushing the 2028 contenders to sign onto.
Advisers to several prospective presidential candidates told CNN they see the polls showing the turn against data centers and social media, with some now coming to believe from their own conversations that more has already gone wrong than has been publicly disclosed — such as AI agents surreptitiously implanted across the internet. Yet they also admit they’re worried about being targeted by money if they speak out too much.
Outside groups linked to the AI industry have spent nearly $50 million on warring ads for 2026 races, according to data from AdImpact. And FEC records show leading AI PACs and nonprofits amassing significantly more, with groups linked to Anthropic and OpenAI combining to raise more than $150 million so far this cycle.
Alex Bores, a former Palantir employee who supported several state measures to regulate AI while serving in the New York assembly, was the subject of so many millions spent for and against him by AI-affiliated PACs this spring that the primary for an open congressional seat in Manhattan became one of the most expensive in history.
He said the prospect of campaign spending comes up regularly in meetings he’s already had with the candidates or teams of former Vice President Kamala Harris, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Gov. Josh Shapiro, Gov. JB Pritzker, Sen. Mark Kelly, Sen. Ruben Gallego, Sen. Jon Ossoff, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Ro Khanna.
Bores, who started a group meant to push the 2028 candidates to take more definitive regulatory positions, told CNN the politicians and advisers keep bringing up the cash.
“‘What was it like having all that money spent against you?’ ‘How did you know they were going to come after you?’” Bores told CNN of the ways they’re “subtly and not so subtly asking, ‘Are there specific trip wires I can avoid?’ ‘How can I steer through these waters in a way that says the right thing about AI and not bring on the incredible amount of money from the other side?’”
“Some of the candidates who have longer odds are more willing to take risks,” Bores added. “Generally, a lot of people are still trying to find a way to appease everyone.”
But there’s money in both directions. Bores, for example, had $8.5 million spent against him by AI-linked PACs but another $22.5 million spent to boost him. One AI industry source, though, warned of Democrats chasing overly regulatory, doom-minded positions that could prompt a backlash against whomever emerges as the party nominee goes up against a Republican, much like the crypto millions that went for Trump in the 2024 election.
Jesse Hunt, a spokesperson for the Leading the Future PAC — largely funded by people with past or current ties to OpenAI and Andreessen Horowitz — said their focus remains innovation.
“We’ll continue to support leaders who want to find consensus on this important topic and reject extremism,” Hunt told CNN.
Warnings from Khan and Raimondo
Also on the call list for many of the potential Democratic contenders trying to stake out AI positions: Khan, who since leaving the Biden administration has become the new nexus for corporate control thinking on the left and even some on the populist right.
Politicians talking about PACs or “p(doom)” — the shorthand for estimating the probability that AI will end humanity — are missing the point, Khan told CNN. Americans are sour on AI because they see their water and electricity rates going up due to the drain of data centers, or just from having a chat bot complicate their customer service experiences, let alone deny their health insurance claims.
In her conversations, Khan said she’s been urging prospective presidential candidates to remember that the AI questions are hitting against a backdrop of Americans feeling more economically precarious than ever while the rich keep getting richer.
“There’s also this basic question of, day after day, these AI executives are explaining how their technologies are hacking into other companies, hacking into other countries’ governments. That would be considered illegal if done by any random person,” she said. “And now that these companies and their very sophisticated technologies are doing it, why isn’t that illegal?”
Even for what little Democrats have put out, “it’s difficult for any of it to seem credible because Congress has been totally gutted of capacity, the executive branch has devolved into total corruption, the courts have become so libertarian,” Khan said. “And so there’s the way in which reckoning with these serious questions around AI and how do we regulate it is going to also require reckoning with the governing crisis.”
The generally more business-minded Raimondo, meanwhile, has through her new group, RAISE US, been pushing a more integrated approach to AI, focused on helping the workforce transition to an artificial intelligence economy.
Raimondo said she’s also been speaking with many of the prospective presidential candidates and has not been overwhelmed with any of what she has heard so far, classifying most as purely reactive to the pushback on data centers or the tweeted warnings of AI executives.
“If you want to be president, you have to step back and say, ‘You know, what’s America going to look like in a few years because of AI? And what is my plan proactively to make sure that we have the innovation and that every American worker has a good job in an AI world and everybody benefits from it?’” Raimondo told CNN. “When people are afraid, the worst thing to do is try to convince him that there’s nothing to worry about — and the best thing to do is to be honest, straight talk, accountable, and reassure them that you got it.”
Asked if she felt confident that the political dynamics will lead to the thoughtfulness and detail she believes AI demands, Raimondo said, “I’m a person of faith,” adding, “presidential candidates right, left, center are going to come to the realization that this could be the biggest issue and it won’t be enough to just be reactive.”
Raimondo had been toying with a presidential run in 2028 herself. She said that’s off the table as she digs in on this.
Caught between a ‘robot apocalypse’ and a ‘money bomb’
Pritzker and California Gov. Gavin Newsom have both spoken with multiple AI industry leaders and, along with Shapiro and Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, issued a new round of state executive orders in September to grapple with the technology.
The prospective presidential candidate who’s engaged the most on AI policy on the federal level, though, is Kelly. He released what he called a roadmap for AI a year ago built around a proposed federal fund, paid into by AI companies, to help pay for higher electricity bills, investing in infrastructure and safety protocols.
Walking to the Senate floor last week where he introduced a new bill to mitigate coming workforce disruptions, Kelly told CNN that he had been part of a briefing by an expert who came to see senators in September warning them how exponentially the technology is changing. Every conversation he has as part of the Armed Services and Intelligence committees, Kelly added, is packed with information about not just what’s happening in the US, but trying to keep up with adversaries, “and boy, every few months it’s something new.”
“I don’t think we’re approaching some kind of robot apocalypse here, you know, ‘Terminator’ stuff,” Kelly said, “but I think we are smart enough to be able to put the guardrails in place, and guide this in a direction that ultimately benefits humanity — that’s what I’d like to see.”
Kelly said among the people he’s spoken with in thinking through his ideas are Raimondo, former Bureau of Labor Statistics commissioner Erika McEntarfer, former acting Labor Secretary and current New York City Deputy Mayor Julie Su and American Federation of Teachers president Randi Weingarten. Obama’s been in his ear too, though Kelly said, “I don’t actually think we necessarily need that, especially if you pay attention to what’s going on in the world.”
Kelly added that he knows the threat of spending against him looms as he considers a 2028 run, but “we shouldn’t be making decisions based on that we think someone’s going to drop a money bomb on us for an election.”
To other Democratic leaders, there’s a political opportunity from explicitly going against the money.
“We have a decision to make: Do we want to stay quiet on AI and crypto and hope that they won’t spend money against us? Or do we want make their money an issue in the election?” said Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, who’s also discussed as a possible presidential candidate. “I think it’d be a huge mistake if we tried to curry favor with two industries that are not politically popular and are trying to get away with murder. So my view is that if we are very loud about the AI industry and the crypto industry’s attempts to try to buy our politics, that’s the safest political play we can make.”
CNN’s David Wright contributed to this report.