Virginia lawmakers pushed through a few artificial intelligence-related bills by the end of their 2026 regular session. Multiple others didn’t make it, apparent victims of an executive order that President Donald Trump signed late last year.
In a Dec. 11 executive order, Trump threatened to withhold Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment money from states with “onerous AI laws.” That could add up to more than $800 million in Virginia for tasks that include providing cellular service to so-called “dead spots.”
Stalled measures included addressing chatbot interactions with minors and the use of AI to evaluate insurance claims and treat patients’ mental health.
“We’ve heard the alarm, if you will, in regards to that,” said Del. Cliff Hayes, D-Chesapeake, during a House of Delegates’ Communications, Technology and Innovation Committee that he chaired in February.
In a world where Trump wants federal control of AI to supersede state measures, members of Virginia’s congressional delegation are working to start that process. Rep. Morgan Griffith, R-Salem, and Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., are pushing bills from their respective chambers that will cover some of the holes in Virginia’s code.
Griffith, a senior member of Energy and Commerce’s Communications and Technology subcommittee, co-sponsored the SECURE Data Act, introduced April 22. Griffith said the act would standardize data privacy protections, granting U.S. consumers rights to access, correct and delete their personal data.
It would also require disclosure of AI’s use “for consequential decision making” and requires parental consent to process personal data for ages 15 and younger, he said in the statement.
“Today, health insurers are increasingly using AI to process and automate prior authorization decisions,” he said. “AI can be helpful in streamlining this process, but in cases of a denial of a medical procedure or treatment, there should be immediate medical review by a qualified medical professional.”
On Thursday, Warner announced that the Senate Judiciary Committee advanced legislation he wrote to protect children from AI chatbots. The bipartisan Guidelines for User Age-verification and Responsible Dialogue (GUARD) Act passed out of the committee unanimously, according to a news release.
It would ban AI companies from providing digital companions to minors and mandate that those companions disclose their nonhuman status and lack of professional credentials. It would also create criminal categories for companies that knowingly use AI products to solicit minors or provide them with sexual content.
“AI chatbots put the mental and physical health of young people at risk,” Warner said in a news release. “I’m encouraged to see this bipartisan legislation advance through committee. It is time to put clear guardrails in place to protect children from manipulative or dangerous chatbot interactions and hold tech companies accountable.”
These were among the issues that General Assembly members attempted to address in the recently concluded session.
A threat to funding
Trump’s executive order directed the Commerce Department to issue a policy notice rendering states with “onerous AI laws … ineligible for non-deployment funds, to the maximum extent allowed” by federal law. Non-deployment funds are the money left over from BEAD grants to the states after their internet connections are made.
Communications, Technology and Innovation postponed action until next year on HB 635, which would have heavily restricted so-called companion chatbots’ interactions with people that have led to self-harm and even suicide. The same committee stalled a Senate bill, SB 796, from Sen. Tara Durant, R-Fredericksburg, which was similar but specifically targeted minors’ use of the technology.
Del. Michelle Maldonado, D-Manassas, introduced the House bill and blamed the Trump administration for its failure, noting the “chilling effect of the AI executive order on state actions.”
“We have seen the administration go after them,” Maldonado said during committee discussion of her measure. “It’s inappropriate. It’s unfair.”
The committee carried over the measures with recommendations that the General Assembly’s Joint Committee on Technology and Science study them. It suggested the same for SB 586, by Sen. Saddam Salim, D-Falls Church, which would have required health insurance companies to show how they use AI to manage claims and prohibit health carriers from relying on it exclusively for decisions.
Hayes, the committee chair, laid out three requirements for such legislation: A bill couldn’t conflict with the state’s existing consumer data protection law. If it cost taxpayers, the budget bill had to provide for it. Finally, it could not jeopardize the BEAD money.
Salim’s bill was among those that should be postponed because they might affect the federal funds, Hayes said in a Feb. 23 hearing.
According to Trump’s executive order, the attorney general’s office was to establish an “AI litigation task force” and the Commerce Department was scheduled to conduct a study of state laws to identify and dispute state laws that “unconstitutionally” regulate interstate commerce, that conflict with existing federal regulations, that require AI models to alter their “truthful outputs” or that would lead to First Amendment violations.
“We have to make sure that we … will not threaten the commonwealth’s over $800 million with regards to the BEAD funding that we have that’s coming from the federal government,” Hayes said.
Salim, in a recent phone interview, said that he believes legislators are moving too slowly from an abundance of caution and are using the executive order as a “smoke screen” as groups, including the Joint Committee on Technology and Science, study them.
“We usually try to see what other states do, and then replicate what’s good and take out what’s bad,” Salim said.
He added: “I thought if we were going to be pushing for change and pushing things forward, we would have moved these bills forward in order to push the federal administration to say they’re already cutting funding for us regardless of what we do and what we don’t do. … I don’t believe it would have impacted those funds.
“I think if it did, we could have had legal counsel … the AG’s office could have sued.”
Federal lawmakers’ responses
Four months after Trump called for states to follow a national policy framework for AI, the administration released its legislative recommendations for such a framework. It is meant to supersede “a patchwork of conflicting state laws” that would “undermine American innovation.” No framework bill in either house of Congress has yet been introduced, but Griffith said a draft is in development from the House of Representatives side.
“There have been discussions behind the scenes at the Energy & Commerce Committee and Rep. [Jay] Obernolte [R-California] is drafting a comprehensive federal AI standards bill that I look forward to reviewing,” Griffith said in an April 24 email from his spokesman.
Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., has publicly circulated a draft bill, as well.
Meanwhile, Warner and Sen. Ted Budd, R-N.C., introduced a bill that would direct the U.S. Department of Labor to collect AI usage data to help illuminate how AI is affecting employment.
“It’s critical that everyone has access to accurate and timely information that can prepare them for a changing labor market,” Warner said in a news release about the Workforce Transparency Act.
As for state lawmaking, Warner has said he is skeptical of Trump’s framework, which he said “lacks significant substance.” In a quote that his office provided on April 24, he said that it is a “gross overreach of federal power” to threaten withholding BEAD funds to states exercising their constitutional rights to “legislate freely.”
Warner was among those in Congress who drafted the 2021 Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which created BEAD.
“As one of the lead drafters of the IIJA’s broadband provisions, I can say with certainty that the president’s actions are counter to Congress’ goal of closing the broadband gap with BEAD,” he said in the April 24 statement. “I remain unsurprised at this administration’s lack of respect for and understanding of the law.”
He added that he hopes Republicans will join him in opposing the administration’s threat to the states.
Resolving to study, setting a safety standard
The General Assembly unanimously passed a resolution, HJ 32, to require the nonpartisan Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission to study AI policies in place at Virginia’s colleges and universities and to develop a model policy for its use. JLARC would also make recommendations for “tools, curricula and other resources” to be commonly available.
Other unanimous votes centered on an AI safety advisory board under the Virginia Information Technologies Agency’s auspices and a bill expanding the Division of Consumer Counsel’s duties to include programs to address AI fraud and abuse.
Failed legislation included a consumer data protection bill, SB 85, which passed the Senate but died in the House. Before crossover, the House killed bills related to law enforcement’s use of AI in investigations and forensic laboratory accreditation.
Salim, the delegate from Falls Church, said he thinks his bills will eventually be passed, and he hopes to see a quicker turnaround time in general.
“We’re going at a walking pace,” he said, “whereas the industry is going 120 miles an hour.”
