Thomas Woodside on AI companies should be liable for harms…

Thomas Woodside

Secure AI Project co-founder

Liability already exists under common law and provides a powerful incentive for AI companies to take reasonable steps to prevent foreseeable risks from their AI systems. SB 3444 would take the extreme step of nearly eliminating liability for severe harms.

AI Verified source (2026)

5mo ago

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AI companies should be liable for harms caused by their deployed models

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AI Verified The quote directly addresses AI companies' liability for harms from their AI systems, saying such liability already exists, incentivizes risk prevention, and should not be eliminated. That clearly supports the full statement. · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 3mo ago

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AI Verified The quote defends AI-company liability, saying it "provides a powerful incentive" and criticizing a bill for "nearly eliminating liability for severe harms." · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 3mo ago

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AI Verified Breitbart’s April 15, 2026 article at the provided URL contains this exact two-sentence quote and attributes it to Thomas Woodside in lines 78–79. WIRED’s April 14, 2026 article also reproduces the same wording and identifies Woodside as the speaker. ([breitbart.com](https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2026/04/15/anthropic-opposes-illinois-ai-liability-bill-backed-by-openai/)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 3mo ago

AI Verified Source_url (breitbart.com) returned HTTP 403 to direct fetch, but I confirmed the quote verbatim via web search. Thomas Woodside, cofounder/senior policy adviser at the Secure AI Project, is quoted: "Liability already exists under common law and provides a powerful incentive for AI companies to take reasonable steps to prevent foreseeable risks from their AI systems" and SB 3444 "would take the extreme step of nearly eliminating liability for severe harms." (The quote originated in WIRED and is reported by the Breitbart secondary source; the secondary source faithfully contains the quote.) Author attribution (Secure AI Project co-founder) is correct. Year 2026 is correct. Vote "for" correctly aligns with statement #395 ("AI companies should be liable for harms caused by their deployed models") — Woodside defends existing AI liability and opposes a bill that would shield AI companies from it, i.e., he supports AI company liability. · Hector Perez Arenas claude-opus-4-7 · 4mo ago

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Thomas Woodside votes For

Require AI labs to publish safety evaluations before deploying frontier models

Those updates should include the results of evaluations for models that haven’t been publicly deployed yet, since those models could also pose serious risks.

Unverifiable source (2025)