Pete Ricketts

Export Control and Compute Governance

Government control or restriction of advanced AI capabilities through trade, export, or compute access.

Introduced the SAFE Chips Act which codifies into law the Trump Administration’s current limits on which advanced Artificial Intelligence (AI) chips are allowed to be sold to Communist China and the MATCH Act which modernizes U.S. export controls to ensure adversaries cannot buy “chokepoint” semiconductor manufacturing equipment (SME) technology from the United States; chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on East Asia and held a hearing specifically on countering China's AI challenge.

Source: Statement · ricketts.senate.gov

Military and National Security Uses of AI

Positions on the use of AI in military, intelligence, or national security contexts.

Ricketts frames AI competition with China explicitly as a national security issue; chaired a subcommittee hearing titled "Countering China's Challenge to American AI Leadership" and said ""Artificial Intelligence will revolutionize daily life and its military uses will shape the global balance of power. Beijing is racing to fuse civilian AI with its military to seize the next revolution in military affairs."

AI Regulation Philosophy

A candidate's general stance on regulating AI systems.

Approvingly cited the Trump administration's AI Action Plan as focused on "openness, markets, and liberal norms cutting red tape, building data centers and other AI infrastructure, exporting our full AI technology stack to allies and partners"

Source: Statement · ricketts.senate.gov

Children's Online Safety

Views on protecting minors from harms related to AI or AI-mediated platforms.

Co-led the Kids Online Safety Act to protect minors from dangerous content

Source: Statement · ricketts.senate.gov