At least 10 states introduced bills with nearly identical phrasing, many containing "get-out-of-jail-free cards" for large developers according to victim advocates interviewed by NPR.
The controversy highlights a growing tension between public safety and the rapid growth of AI infrastructure.
Concrete consequences of these industry-backed drafts include extensive exemptions for chatbots housed within search engines, research tools, or business productivity software.
Policy analysts warn that these loopholes could effectively shield the most popular consumer platforms—such as Google’s Gemini, OpenAI’s ChatGPT, and Microsoft’s Copilot—from the very safety regulations the laws intended to enforce.
In the absence of federal oversight, these state-level battles are shaping the future of AI liability.
While some governors have vetoed bills they viewed as overly protective of corporations, others have signed them into law despite protests from families affected by chatbot-related harms.
Moving forward, technical mechanisms such as "technically feasible measures" to prevent abuse remain poorly defined, often leaving it up to the tech companies themselves to determine the extent of their responsibility for preventing digital harm to children.