The AI Data Centre Moratorium Act was introduced 25 March 2026 but killed by the Democratic caucus. Senator Fetterman called it 'China First' and Senator Warner called it 'idiocy'. It had no PATH through the Republican-controlled Congress.Source: Lowdown

What is Bernie Sanders's robot tax proposal?

Sanders proposed a per-position levy on corporations replacing workers with AI or automation. Revenue would recoup lost payroll taxes and fund retraining. His HELP Committee staff report claimed AI could replace more than half of jobs in 15 of 20 major sectors over a decade. The bill has no legislative PATH.Source: Lowdown

Did Maine's data centre moratorium come from Sanders's bill?

Maine passed the first US statewide data centre moratorium on 22 April 2026, six weeks after the Sanders/AOC federal bill was killed. Sanders and AOC's federal proposal is still pending. Good Jobs First counts 12 states with active moratorium bills in 2026.Source: Lowdown

Background

Bernie Sanders is the independent US Senator for Vermont, caucusing with Democrats since 2007, and a two-time Democratic presidential primary contender (2016, 2020) whose campaigns pushed Universal healthcare and wealth-inequality policy into the mainstream. He chaired the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee in 2023-24 and now serves as its ranking member.

Sanders has spent decades as Washington's most vocal champion of working-class economic security, a role that has extended into 2026 legislative campaigns on both AI labour policy and defence oversight.

On 25 March 2026 Sanders co-introduced the AI Data Centre Moratorium Act with Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, which would ban new AI data centre construction until Congress passes worker protection, consumer rights, civil rights and environmental legislation. He simultaneously pushed a one-time 50% tax on AI-company stock to fund worker retraining. Both bills are dead: the moratorium was killed by his own party, with Senator Fetterman calling it 'China First' and Warner calling it 'idiocy'.

Yet the moratorium idea has propagated to the states: Maine passed the first US statewide data centre freeze on 22 April 2026, with 12 state legislatures running similar bills.

Sanders's robot-tax proposal remains stalled, but it now sits opposite OpenAI's own idea for capturing AI's windfall: a 5% US government equity stake worth roughly $42.6bn, pitched by chief executive Sam Altman as a public wealth fund modelled on the Alaska Permanent Fund. The two proposals attack the same distributional question from opposite ends, OpenAI offering Washington a permanent equity share and Sanders proposing to tax the windfall once, and Sanders's plan has still not advanced to committee.

Sanders broke ranks with most senators on the Iran conflict, co-signing a letter with 46 senators demanding a public investigation into the Minab school strike, citing Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's own 'no stupid rules of engagement' statement as context for the inquiry.