AI companies have poured more than $20 million into New York's 12th congressional district primary, turning a Manhattan House race into the defining early battleground over federal AI regulation.
AI companies have funneled more than $20 million into a New York Democratic primary race that has become a proxy battle for how — and how much — the federal government should regulate artificial intelligence.
The contest in New York's 12th congressional district, a Manhattan seat that leans heavily Democratic, pits state Assemblyman Alex Bores against fellow Assemblyman Micah Lasher and Jack Schlossberg, a grandson of President John F. Kennedy.
Two major super PACs affiliated with AI interests are clashing directly in the district — the only House race this cycle where both groups are simultaneously active.
Leading the Future, whose backers include venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman, and AI software company Perplexity, spent $8 million opposing Bores. Bores was a central force behind New York State legislation mandating safety and security regulation for powerful AI models.
Countering that effort is Public First Action, which has received $20 million from Anthropic. The group has directed $11 million in support of Bores, according to Federal Election Commission data reviewed Monday.
Public First Action is an arm of Americans for Responsible Innovation, an AI safety organization. Its president, Brad Carson, said the group has received support from employees at major AI companies he described as "mid-level people who are very scared about where the technology is going."
The two PACs occupy opposing regulatory philosophies. Leading the Future favors lighter guardrails on the industry. Public First Action advocates for restrictions not only on AI outputs but on how the models themselves are built.
"Safety should be designed into the AI models," Carson said. "Regulating the outputs long, long, long after said problem has arisen does very little justice to the people who are harmed by the AI."
Leading the Future's co-leader Josh Vlasto said in a statement that the PAC "supports passing a national regulatory framework for AI that creates jobs for American workers, helps America win the race against China, and includes strong guardrails that protects the safety of kids, users, and communities."
Bores, an engineer and computer scientist who previously worked at Palantir, pushed back on the framing that regulation and competitiveness are mutually exclusive.
"Regulation is not going to be the reason we win or lose this race versus China," Bores told reporters Monday while campaigning outside a subway stop. "We can invest in AI that's meant to help doctors diagnose disease without encouraging the AI that's helping healthcare deny claims. We can get the best of both worlds."
Several smaller PACs have also entered the race on the pro-regulation side. Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen donated $3 million in support of Bores through a PAC called You Can Push Back. Anthropic's Dan Ziegler donated to another super PAC, DREAM NYC, which ran advertising linking Bores to opposition against "Trump's billionaire allies." A group called Guardrails Alliance has spent roughly $258,000 in the race, aiming to amplify concerns among OpenAI employees about the political spending of some of the company's executives.
The race unfolds against a backdrop of shifting federal AI policy. President Donald Trump signed an executive order earlier in June asking AI companies to voluntarily provide their models to the federal government for capability assessments ahead of full release.
Recent polling shows Bores running neck-and-neck with Lasher, with Schlossberg as another serious contender. George Conway, a lawyer previously married to former Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway, is also among the eight candidates on the ballot.
Because the district is reliably Democratic, the primary winner is considered all but certain to be seated in Congress. Even a Bores defeat may not fully resolve the regulatory question — Lasher voted for the New York AI bill Bores championed, and his campaign website states the country "can't leave it up to Big Tech to regulate itself."
Marc Sabatini is a staff writer at TechEchelon covering enterprise software, cybersecurity, and the regulatory beats that shape both. He focuses on the deal flow and policy decisions that move markets.
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