“This is where these companies know what you Googled, have so much of your private data that they can set a specific price for you. So think about, if somebody Googles somebody's obituary, next thing you know, an airline jacks up your air fares because they know you've got to get to a funeral and will pay what it takes. There's no good reason for that.”
On with Kara Swisher · Tech Strategy & Big Tech · November 2026
Context
Kara Swisher asked Rep. Greg Casar about his AI bills. This is his example for a bill to ban AI-driven personalized pricing, sometimes called surveillance pricing.
Transcript
…think that you should have to pay higher electric bills for these guys, or our national security should be compromised. So, it really, I think, is going to be about taking a side and then passing meaningful legislation, in my view, to protect your jobs, to reduce your bills, protect your safety.
Greg, you have a couple of bills. One is the displacement of workers. The other is a ban on artificial superintelligence you sponsored along with Bernie Sanders in the Senate. Can you just give more specifics about these and where you think they are in terms of voter interest?
I'll start with our ban on superintelligence bill. It basically says we should not develop AI that is too powerful for humans to control. And if you remember, when Senator Sanders came out against unregulated data centers, people were like, that's some way out there progressive idea. Now it's the mainstream of American politics. Similarly, here, you know, this idea of like, why should we develop AI that could develop a bioweapon without our authorization? I mean, who wants that? That's nuts. We shouldn't be allowed to do that and we should have it under control. On jobs, I've developed a tax proposal that disincentivizes AI companies from getting rid of your job and getting a tax break for it. Instead, they should pay a meager tax that increases if unemployment increases to make it so that we don't wind up in a situation where you've got structural mass unemployment. We should be able to develop our technology in a way that benefits people, but not in a way that puts lots of people out of work. And then I'll add a third one real briefly, Kira, that is like this simple affordability stuff. I have a bill, and Ruben Gallego has in the…
So Sam, talk about it from a California perspective. Obviously, California has been one of the states that's governed it more than other states, obviously. But it has to be a federal thing. How do you look as a legislator from California? How do you look at what has to happen in AI and what is…
Yeah, I think, you know, as you discuss all the issues, and I would never
minimize the jobs issue because I think that's going to be a massive disruption to our economy. We have to confront it. But I think the most urgent issues we have to focus on are around AI safety because the cybersecurity risk, the loss of control risk, what we've already seen with the gentleman…
More from On with Kara Swisher
