Former DOJ Antitrust Chief Says AI Needs Basic Rules as Labs Seek Exemption

Kanter, now a professor of law at WashU and professor of technology policy at Carnegie Mellon University, spoke as debate over AI safety and regulation intensifies. Researchers at major AI labs including Anthropic and Google DeepMind have left their positions in noisy ways, saying the models pose real threats and that safety is not being taken seriously across the industry. Other researchers have said the chance of AI killing everyone is greater than 10 percent.

The CEOs of the large AI companies have issued various calls to slow down development and develop regulation, including asking for antitrust exemptions so they can coordinate on safety issues. The requests have led to accusations that the companies are seeking regulatory capture, attempting to form a cartel, and looking for a way out from investor pressure ahead of their IPOs.

During his time as antitrust chief, Kanter brought major antitrust cases against Google, Apple and Ticketmaster, and along with Lina Khan led what amounted to a full reboot of American antitrust policy. He won the cases against Google and Ticketmaster. The case against Apple is still live in the Trump DOJ, surprising many. The reboot has also produced unusual alliances in the AI debate: David Sacks, a libertarian and former Trump AI czar, has approvingly retweeted Lina Khan saying there is no need for an antitrust exemption.

In the interview, Kanter described the current moment by analogy. “The state of the world right now is like we’ve invented cars and trucks, but we have no lines on the road, no traffic lights and no stop signs and no speed limits,” he said. He said the world has invented an incredibly powerful technology that is transforming how people live, conduct business, socialize, and seek, generate and consume information. “We need some basic rules of the road,” Kanter said. He said he thinks about the issue on two fronts: what companies should be doing and what government should be doing, with responsibilities on both ends.

Asked whether asking for regulation necessarily forms a cartel, Kanter was presented with the view that the major frontier AI companies—OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind and even Elon Musk—do not necessarily like each other but are saying in concert that they should slow down. The interview cited Anthropic’s Dario Amodei and his phrase “pace the frontier.” The host’s read was that the companies do not trust each other, are in a prisoner’s dilemma, and need an outside force, most likely the government, to enforce a policy framework they must agree with. Kanter responded, “Kind of,” and began an interpretation that started with the most generous reading. The published interview was the first of a two-part Decoder series on the future of business.