Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) warns that AI will reshape society by accelerating a major winner-take-all type of inequality. The senator also described AI as an existential test for America’s founding “moral covenant” that risks turning humans into “raw material” and children into victims.
“Artificial intelligence is testing our commitment to the great moral covenant that binds us together as a nation,” Hawley began in an op-ed for First Things, titled, “The American Covenant’s Answer to AI.”
Hawley then elaborated on the moral stakes of AI, adding, “The decisions we must soon make about the most powerful technology of our lifetimes are among the most difficult we have yet faced. These decisions go far beyond questions of economics or policy.”
“They are questions of labor and the family, of freedom and the value of human life. They are fundamental questions of our identity as Americans and the nature of this republic given to us by God,” Hawley wrote.
“We do not have to imagine the stakes,” the senator continued, before diving into what he described as a “K-shaped” society, which he believes is the result of AI’s social impact. “We are watching a handful of companies assemble a concentration of capital, information, and political power without precedent in the American experience,” Hawley pointed out.
Hawley explains that the upper arm of the K represents the developers, executives, and investors of AI firms, while the lower arm of the K represents blue collar workers, professionals like paralegals, and fresh grads.
“The country is sorting itself into the two arms of a single letter,” he elaborated. “The upper arm grows fabulously rich. The lower arm gets quietly replaced, and — what is harder to bear than the loss of a wage — made quietly redundant.”
In concluding his op-ed, Hawley also made note of a deeper choice, writing, “Behind all these challenges lies the great moral vision that launched our national experiment — the covenant sworn on the Arbella.”
“The reason we resist the K-shaped economy, the false-choice politics, the soft tyrannies of soft technologies is older than our republic, and will outlast every technology we ever confront,” Hawley said. “We are not raw material in the hands of those who build the machines. We are persons. We are made in the image of God,” the senator asserted.
Hawley then offered a call to action, adding, “That is why we will bend the arc of this technology toward the welfare of the nation, toward the welfare of our families, of our children, and of labor.”
“We will not surrender our principles to the technology,” the senator declared. “The technology will answer to our principles.”
Hawley’s op-ed echoes the themes of Code Red: The Left, the Right, China, and the Race to Control AI, the instant bestseller written by Breitbart News social media director Wynton Hall to serve as the definitive guide on how the MAGA movement can create positions on AI that benefit humanity without handing control of our nation to the leftists of Silicon Valley or allowing the Chinese to take over the world.
Senator Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), who was named one of TIME’s 100 Most Influential People in AI, praised Code Red as a “must-read.” She added: “Few understand our conservative fight against Big Tech as Hall does,” making him “uniquely qualified to examine how we can best utilize AI’s enormous potential, while ensuring it does not exploit kids, creators, and conservatives.” Award-winning investigative journalist and Public founder Michael Shellenberger calls Code Red “illuminating,” ”alarming,” and describes the book as “an essential conversation-starter for those hoping to subvert Big Tech’s autocratic plans before it’s too late.”
Alana Mastrangelo is a reporter for Breitbart News. You can follow her on Facebook and X at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.