Warren accuses AI firms of lobbying to weaken oversight in trade accord

Senator Elizabeth Warren is picking a fight with the AI industry, and this time the battlefield is a trade agreement most people forgot existed. On July 23, Warren publicly accused major AI corporations of lobbying the Trump administration to water down transparency and oversight provisions in the updated US-Mexico-Canada Agreement. Her argument: Big Tech is trying to use international trade law as a shield against domestic regulation. What Warren actually wants In a letter dated July 22 and addressed to US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, Warren laid out her core complaint. Under existing USMCA rules, AI companies are only required to disclose details about their models, like source code, algorithms, and training data, during formal government investigations. She urged Greer to expand regulatory access to this information even without an active probe into a specific company. The senator characterized the current framework as a win for Big Tech, one that entrenches protections for proprietary AI systems and keeps regulators perpetually one step behind. Warren didn’t name specific companies as lobbyists, instead pointing broadly at “major AI companies” and their industry groups....