The Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation voted 16-12 on Wednesday to advance President Donald Trump’s nomination of Howard Lutnick to run the Commerce Department.
The committee’s vote sends Lutnick’s nomination to the full Senate for further consideration.
During his nomination hearing, Lutnick told the committee he wants to apply Commerce’s model on cyber regulation to the rules for AI regulation.
“It has to be an American-driven leadership in AI,” Lutnick said. “Leverage what we’re great at, and issue standards and practices like we did in cyber that will encourage [the] private sector to be the dominant winner as we are in America.”
Lutnick elaborated further on his regulation goals and said he wants the United States to dominate global standards for AI production.
“I think we should try to have a light touch model in AI,” Lutnick said. “Set up standards so the world heeds our standards and goes with our standards would be very important for America and something I’m going to try to drive.”
When asked about the CHIPS and Science Act, Lutnick seemed hesitant to fully embrace the act. He appeared to have other ideas for increasing domestic semiconductor production.
“The CHIPS Act was an excellent down payment to begin that process,” Lutnick said of increased domestic semiconductor production. “We need to study it, but we need to make sure that we get the benefit of the bargain and domestic manufacturing of semiconductors happens in America.”
Tech Bills Also Advance
In addition to advancing Lutnick’s nomination, the committee also voted on a motion to favorably advance several tech-related bills during Wednesday’s meeting.
These include the Rural Broadband Protection Act of 2025, Strengthening Support for American Manufacturing Act, Promoting Resilient Supply Chains Act of 2025, Insure Cybersecurity Act of 2025, and Kids Off Social Media Act.
The Rural Broadband Protection Act of 2025 would require the Federal Communications Commission to establish a vetting process for prospective applicants for high-cost universal service program funding.
The Strengthening Support for American Manufacturing Act would require the secretary of commerce to produce a report with recommendations on how to improve programs related to supply chain resilience, as well as manufacturing and industrial innovation.
Similarly, the Promoting Resilient Supply Chains Act would authorize the Commerce Department to work with the private sector and U.S. government partners to strengthen American supply chains for critical industries and emerging technologies – anticipating supply chain disruptions before they happen.
The Insure Cybersecurity Act of 2025 aims to establish a working group on cyber insurance, to require the dissemination of informative resources for issuers and customers of cyber insurance.
Finally, the Kids Off Social Media Act would prevent kids under the age of 13 from accessing social media platforms, prohibit the use of algorithmically-targeted content to users under the age of 17, and limit the use of social media in schools.
“Today, families face a challenge previous generations could not imagine: a rapidly changing digital environment targeting our kids,” Chairman Ted Cruz, R-Texas, one of the authors of the bill, said during Wednesday’s meeting.
The senator added that the legislation “prevents Big Tech from pushing the harmful content that does so much damage to our children.”
These bills now head to the Senate floor for further consideration.
