Chuck Schumer is a Democratic United States Senator from New York. He was Senate Majority Leader in 2024 and is Senate Minority Leader in 2026, the position in which he is addressed in letters on AI legislation from advocacy coalitions, state attorneys general and other senators (Senate coalition letter on redlines for AI safety legislation (Americans for Responsible Innovation, September 2026); S. 2938 — Artificial Intelligence Risk Evaluation Act of 2025 (bill text)).
Senate AI Working Group
As Majority Leader, Schumer was one of four members of the Bipartisan Senate AI Working Group, with Sens. Todd Young (R-Indiana), Mike Rounds (R-South Dakota) and Martin Heinrich (D-New Mexico). On May 15, 2024 the group released "Driving U.S. Innovation in Artificial Intelligence: A Roadmap for Artificial Intelligence Policy in the United States Senate," which encourages at least $32 billion per year for non-defense AI innovation, the figure proposed by the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence (Source: mayerbrown.com).
Letters addressed to him in 2026
- State attorneys general on the KIDS Act. A bipartisan coalition of state and territorial attorneys general wrote on May 26, 2026 opposing the Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act, H.R. 7757, in a letter addressed to Schumer, Speaker Mike Johnson, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and others (State Attorneys General letter opposing the KIDS Act, H.R. 7757 (May 2026); Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act (KIDS Act, H.R. 7757)).
- ARI coalition letter to the President. Schumer was among the officials copied on the letter of September 9, 2026 in which Americans for Responsible Innovation and 27 other organizations asked President Trump to publish the White House's framework for pre-release assessment of frontier AI models (Coalition letter to President Trump on public release of the White House frontier-AI review framework (September 2026)).
- Hawley and Blumenthal on the AI Risk Evaluation Act. On September 15, 2026 Sens. Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal wrote to Majority Leader John Thune, Speaker Johnson, Schumer and Jeffries asking both chambers to consider the Artificial Intelligence Risk Evaluation Act "for a floor vote and as model legislation to address frontier AI risks" (S. 2938 — Artificial Intelligence Risk Evaluation Act of 2025 (bill text)).
- ARI-led Senate coalition letter. A letter dated September 16, 2026, led by Americans for Responsible Innovation and signed by 20 organizations and five individuals, is addressed to Thune, Schumer and "Members of the U.S. Senate." It asks that any Senate AI framework "empower the government, not AI companies, to set mandatory, binding, and enforceable safety standards for advanced AI," require auditing that is "both mandatory and conducted independently," and set a federal floor preserving the states' authority to regulate further (Senate coalition letter on redlines for AI safety legislation (Americans for Responsible Innovation, September 2026)).
- State attorneys general on federal frontier AI regulation. A letter dated September 23, 2026 from the attorneys general of 24 states, the District of Columbia and American Samoa, led by New York's Letitia James and New Jersey's Jennifer Davenport, is addressed to Schumer, Johnson, Thune and Jeffries. It asks Congress "to immediately establish comprehensive federal regulation and safety protocols for frontier artificial intelligence," with mandatory federal oversight of safety testing, government-led incident response and no preemption of state law (Letter from state attorneys general to congressional leadership urging federal frontier AI regulation (September 2026)).
Public position in September 2026
Axios reported on September 11, 2026, after Jacob Coxon's resignation from Anthropic, that congressional leadership had largely stayed quiet on AI safety and that the offices of Thune, House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, Schumer and Jeffries did not respond to requests for comment (Source: axios.com). No statement by Schumer on the frontier-AI bill being developed by Thune and Sen. Amy Klobuchar is recorded in the sources held.
Schumer and other senior Democrats criticized President Trump ahead of his September 24, 2026 summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping, citing continued chip sales to Chinese entities and his approach to AI; the criticism became public on September 23, and only the lede of the coverage was retrieved (Source: insideaipolicy.com). See US-China AI Competition: Different Races, Different Metrics.
Relationships
- related: Senate coalition letter on redlines for AI safety legislation (Americans for Responsible Innovation, September 2026) — addressee
- related: Coalition letter to President Trump on public release of the White House frontier-AI review framework (September 2026) — copied
- related: S. 2938 — Artificial Intelligence Risk Evaluation Act of 2025 (bill text), Artificial Intelligence Risk Evaluation Act (S. 2938) — addressee of the Hawley–Blumenthal floor-vote request
- related: State Attorneys General letter opposing the KIDS Act, H.R. 7757 (May 2026) — addressee
- related: Todd Young — fellow member of the Bipartisan Senate AI Working Group
- related: John Thune — Majority Leader and co-addressee
- related: Coordinated slowdown proposals compared — congressional responses to the September 2026 pacing debate
- related: Letter from state attorneys general to congressional leadership urging federal frontier AI regulation (September 2026) — addressee.