Artificial intelligence giants have fired the first shot in a regulatory battle set to dominate the 2026 midterm elections, and the industry’s prospects for victory are already looking good.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Thursday rescinded a bill that would have enacted modest artificial intelligence protections, hours after President Donald Trump issued an executive order to repeal state laws that Hochul is now trying to weaken.
Hochul’s apparent capitulation to the AI industry comes just one day after the AI industry PAC Leading the Future — which has a $100 million slush fund funded by OpenAI president Greg Brockman and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, among others — released its first ad of the 2026 cycle, attacking New York Assemblyman Alex Bores, a sponsor of the bill and one of the many Democrats running to replace the retiree. Congressman Jerry Nadler.
The political ad’s narrator ominously says that Bores “wants bureaucrats in Albany to regulate AI — the same dysfunctional Albany that can’t balance the budget or keep businesses in New York.” The voice goes on to name-check the RAISE Act, which Bores helped write. According to the attack ad, Borres sponsored legislation that would create “a confusing patchwork of state rules that will destroy innovation, cost New York jobs and fail to keep people safe.”
The ad, which has been shared with reporters but does not appear to be running as a paid ad on any platform, is said to be the first of many the PAC intends to target Bores’ campaign for a New York bill that would require the largest artificial intelligence companies to publish their security and risk protocols and alert authorities of serious security incidents. The legislation would also impose fines on companies that fail to meet its standards.
“Frankly, I’m not surprised,” Bores said of finding himself targeted by the PAC.
Borres, a computer engineer before entering politics, was already starting to feel the heat from industry as he drafted the bill — even as he actively solicited feedback from the largest artificial intelligence labs as he drafted the legislation. “We had a very productive conversation. We didn’t always agree, but they made a lot of suggestions for the bill — some of which I adopted and some of which I didn’t,” he said, adding that when the bill went into committee, things changed and it became clear that it might actually pass. Suddenly, his constituents were flooded with text messages and social media ads targeting him.
When Borres saw the ad shared by Leading the Future this week, he immediately knew it wasn’t just about him, but an attempt to intimidate another politician: Gov. Kathy Hochul: “My reaction was, ‘Oh, this is a message to the governor’ — it wasn’t just about defeating me.”
On Tuesday, the day before the ad appeared in a new story, Hochul launched the two-week “chapter amendment” process that will determine whether she signs the RAISE Act into law. “They want the governor to be intimidated by the idea that they might target her next,” Bores said. Hochul is up for re-election in 2026.
as rolling stones Recent reports suggest that AI industry PACs are borrowing a tactic used by 2024 cryptocurrency lobbyists this election cycle: aggressively targeting a select number of candidates and targeting them with significant funding to demonstrate they can inflict political pain on candidates seen as opposed to them while boosting candidates they view as allies, with little mention of AI. (Chris Lehane helped successfully execute this strategy on behalf of the crypto industry during his time at Coinbase in 2024 and is now OpenAI’s chief global affairs officer.)
Bores is one of nine candidates who have announced their intention to succeed Nadler. Nadler represented New York’s 12th District, which includes much of Manhattan, for 36 years. So far, the field includes Instagram-famous JFK descendant Jack Schlossberg, 25-year-old Parkland shooting survivor and March for Our Lives co-founder Cameron Kasky, City Councilman Erik Bottcher and former NPR host Jami Floyd, among others. (CNN host Don Lemon and attorney George Conway, the ex-husband of Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway, have already flown test balloons.)
In such a crowded primary, the amount of money a political action committee has at its disposal can make a big difference. But Bores didn’t seem particularly disturbed. From his perspective, the spending is simply an effort to boost his work regulating artificial intelligence — something he says is widely popular with voters. “84% of New Yorkers support the RAISE Act and 80% of Americans want sensible regulation of artificial intelligence,” Bores said.
He added that AI “naturally becomes something that voters care about more because it has more of an impact on their daily lives — whether it’s through layoffs, or companies refusing to hire more people; whether it’s through utility bills as data centers come online; whether it’s the impact on kids and chatbots. … This may not have been a topic people asked about as much a few years ago, but it’s certainly become more of a topic now.”
Bores likes to say that he is “the first elected Democrat of any level in the state of New York with a computer science degree,” a fact he finds “10 percent cool and 90 percent scary.” Specifically, this degree is a master’s degree in computer science, specializing in machine learning. Bores has worked in the industry for a decade, including a stint at Palantir, whose co-founder Joe Lonsdale was a major donor to PACs funding campaigns against him.
As they attack Bores, the tech giants are also trying to win over politicians who can persuade them to support their cause.
Transformer first reported on Thursday that Hochul had moved to significantly weaken Bores’ bill. Journalist Issie Lapowsky wrote: “The governor’s proposal would repeal the RAISE Act outright and replace it word-for-word with minimal changes from California’s recently enacted law, SB 53.”
With input from the same people behind Leading the Future, California’s bill was significantly softened at the last minute.
State lawmakers would need to agree to Hochul’s hike before the governor can sign the bill into law — an outcome that seems unlikely. However, if the price increases persist, it will be a major boon to the AI industry: the two largest and most important countries have set a common cap on potential regulation.
A spokesperson for Hochul said in a statement, “In the absence of federal leadership on responsible AI, New York is passing common-sense laws to protect children, families, and consumers, and our approach should serve as a model for the nation. Governor Hochul has been at the forefront of the innovation economy and remains committed to responsibly advancing AI as he reviews legislation.”
Borres issued his statement after Trump announced his executive order late Thursday aimed at banning state regulations in favor of federal standards.
“Let’s be clear about what just happened: A handful of AI oligarchs bribed Donald Trump to sell out America’s future and intimidate countries that want to put basic guardrails in place against the most powerful technology ever created,” the candidate wrote. “Trump didn’t just ignore the potential dangers of runaway AI developments; he left the door open for them. That’s why we need more members of Congress to install the necessary guardrails before it’s too late.”
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