Andrew Yang warns US ‘not doing enough’ to prepare for AI’s impact: ‘Dramatic changes’

Former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang spoke to Fox News Digital about the dangers of artificial intelligence, known as AI, and said the government is not doing nearly enough to prepare for the potentially harmful effects.

“AI is a very, very powerful technology and set of tools and there’s nothing intrinsically positive or negative about tools, but there is something positive and negative about how tools can be used,” Yang told Fox News Digital this week. “And you can very clearly see deepfake videos already being employed for political purposes. Fake pictures of terrorist attacks being used to manipulate the stock market. A robocall in President Biden’s voice trying to discourage turnout and we’re just at the beginning of this.”

“Pretty soon,” Yang said. “We’re not going to be able to tell up from down and left from right and if people show you a video of me doing something heinous, I’ll just shrug and be like, didn’t happen and that could be the best defense before too long.”

Yang went on to say that there are “going to be dramatic changes that accompany AI” and “our institutions just aren’t in the least prepared for it.”

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Andrew Yang speaks to attendees ahead of Democratic challenger U.S. Rep. Dean Phillips’ arrival at a campaign rally on January 22, 2024 in Manchester, New Hampshire.   ((Photo by Brandon Bell/Getty Images))

Experts have long warned that AI will result in significant job losses in the United States and FOX Business reported last year that 27% of jobs are at high risk of automation as a result of the AI boom.

The proliferation of artificial intelligence platforms such as Chat GPT will likely mean 40% of the global workforce will need to re-skill over the next three years as companies integrate the technology, a recent study found. 

“When I was running for president in 2020, I was talking about the job loss, which I’m still very, very concerned about,” Yang said. “The IMF said that about 40% of global jobs could be affected. That’s hundreds of millions of workers around the world but you can see the effect right now in our politics and it’s just beginning.”

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Former presidential candidate Andrew Yang speaks at FreedomFest in Las Vegas on July 16, 2022 (Fox News Digital)

“We are categorically not doing enough to prepare for AI and its impact in the labor market,” Yang told Fox News Digital.

Yang was in South Carolina this week campaigning for Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips, who is running against President Biden in the presidential primary and has also spoken about AI as recently as this month.

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2020 Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang (left) teams up with Rep. Dean Phillips of Minnesota, who’s running for the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination, at a Dean campaign event, on Jan. 18, 2024 in Manchester, New Hampshire (Fox News – Monica Oroz)

“AI, my friends, we don’t have 100 years,” Phillips told a crowd in New Hampshire. “We have months, if not just a couple of years at the most. I anticipated and am prepared for it, and I will be our first AI president.”

Phillips has pledged to put together an AI “task force” to study its applications and outcomes.

Fox News Digital’s Elizabeth Elkind and Emma Colton contributed to this report