Rick Scott: U.S. Must Lead the AI Race and Get Federal Spending Under Control

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Guy Benson: Well, joining us now is U.S. Senator Rick Scott of Florida. I see that he’s weighed in earlier today on AI and the AI race and a lot of the concerns out there. You’ve got actually some AI tech leaders saying that there needs to be more oversight, more regulation in the space. And I actually share some of those concerns. I’m not sure if the government is always good at this type of thing. I worry about China.

In fact, here’s what President Trump said when he was asked about AI in cut one.

Guy Benson: Do you have any concerns about AI leading to human extinction?

President Trump: No, I don’t have any. I have concerns that if we don’t win AI, we’re going to be put in a very bad position.

Guy Benson: This is based on what some people are calling extreme fear-mongering about AI, with some developers saying this could lead to human extinction. Trump says he doesn’t share that concern, but he does worry that if we don’t win the race–we didn’t mention China, but I think we all understand–if we don’t win the AI race, that’s a very bad position. I absolutely agree with that because we know the CCP would be totally unscrupulous in their use of AI and their development of it.

So, Senator Scott, welcome back to the show. What do you make of this whole issue? Because it is a very hot one right now.

Senator Rick Scott: Well, first of all, I think it’s really important. AI is not going anywhere. We’ve got to move forward, and we’ve got to do it safely. We’ve got to be the leader. We can’t lose to China. We can’t allow China, in any area, to set the rules because, you know what, it will be harmful to Americans.

And look, I’m from the business world. I run companies. If I was the CEO of a company and I said, “Hey, I built something that’s going to kill you, and by the way, I don’t want to fix it myself. I want you, Congress, to go do something,” I think that’s unfair and wrong.

If you’re building something that’s going to destroy mankind, you have a responsibility to act responsibly. And, by the way, Congress can’t get anything done. We can’t even pass election security, so it’s not going to happen.

So whatever we do, first off, these companies need to do the right thing. Then we’ve got to do this methodically in Congress. But the idea that Congress is going to figure this out and do it thoughtfully is not–it doesn’t make sense. We’ve got to protect our citizens. We’ve got to especially protect our kids’ safety. And if you’re running one of these companies, you have an obligation to, if you think it’s going to kill mankind, it’s your responsibility to stop that.

Guy Benson: Let me ask you about–you just mentioned keeping kids safe in another realm. You’ve sponsored the Safe Kids Act. This has to do with the birth tourism issue and the citizenship question that was before the Supreme Court, birthright citizenship. It’s definitely been a loophole that’s been exploited, especially in certain places by specific people. What are you trying to do to fix that problem?

Senator Rick Scott: Well, it’s real simple. If you’re from a country that wants to destroy us, like Russia, China, Iran, or North Korea, you cannot have a surrogate child in this country that’s a U.S. citizen.

Let me think about this. Somebody that wants to kill us, right? So let’s say that a leader of the CCP–they can send over an egg, an embryo, and sperm over here and create a baby, use a surrogate, and it’s a U.S. citizen. They could take it back home and raise it up to come back here as a U.S. citizen to harm us.

Now, does that make sense to you? No. It makes no sense to anybody. So this has to stop.

No one thought that you could become a U.S. citizen through surrogacy where this person–the parents–never come to this country. They’ve never stepped a foot in this country. I can make the argument that if you’re a tourist and you have a child, you shouldn’t be a U.S. citizen. But guess what? If you never came here, you just sent an egg and sperm over here and you create a U.S. citizen, that’s wrong.

So I’m trying to stop that.

Guy Benson: The president last week in Dallas, Texas, was addressing the sort of mini-midterm convention of Republicans, and one of the things that he threw out there was this dividend check idea: $5,000 to every citizen adult if the Republicans win the elections. He also suggested in an interview that Congress wouldn’t have to play a role in that.

I know that you’ve been a real stickler, as I am, on the national debt, very concerned about that. Does this raise concerns for you, just the sheer–starting with the sheer cost of it, over a trillion dollars?

Senator Rick Scott: I want to cut taxes. I cut taxes 100 times as governor. But as part of that, I balanced the budget, and actually I paid off a third of the state debt when I was governor.

So should we cut taxes? Yeah, our taxes, in my opinion, are too high. But we also have to balance this budget. We have $40 trillion worth of this. We have already $40.151 trillion worth of debt. We saw today the 10-year at 4.99%. Interest rates are going up. We’ve got to balance the budgets.

So pay for it. I’m all in. Let’s pay for it.

Guy Benson: And what does that look like, cutting spending, since it seems like no one really wants to do that?

Senator Rick Scott: No, you mean we’ve got to balance the budget. I mean, guys, we all balance our budgets. We have to, or we go bankrupt. Businesses have to. Your federal government ought to do the same thing.

When I was governor of Florida, Florida had not balanced its budget but once in 40 years before I became governor. You know how I did it? I said, “Our revenues are going to be X. Okay, guess what? We will not spend more than that.”

Shocking. People say, “Oh, you can’t balance a budget.” Yes, you can. We do it all the time. There’s a lot of them like to have that every family in this country has. But you don’t do it until you save the money and you try to get out of debt, not keep increasing debt.

We are destroying the chance for success. A new kid, a new child in this country walks in with $100,000 worth of debt plus interest every year on that. How is that fair? How can you say, as a parent or grandparent, that you’re treating that child or grandchild fairly when you’re giving them all this debt?

I mean, it makes me so mad, all this debt that we have, because it’s completely unfair to the poor. It’s completely unfair to the middle class.

Guy Benson: And, of course, as you mentioned, to the next generation. A couple of minutes left here. What’s the argument, aside from the Democrats and their insanity and their extremism, what’s the argument to voters heading into November on behalf of Republican candidates, would you say?

Senator Rick Scott: It should be, number one, we’re going to get you a job. Look at the Trump economy versus the Biden economy.

That’s number one. Number two, we’re going to do everything we can to get the cost of living down. They’re going to do the opposite.

Number three, we are going to keep you safe. I mean, we have a secure border. We’re going to make sure we don’t allow terrorists and criminals into our country.

We’re going to do everything that we can to make sure when you go to school, right, you’re going to get a great education and you’re not going to be indoctrinated.

So those, if you think about a family–jobs, education for their kids and their grandkids, and public safety–that’s why you vote for Republicans.

Guy Benson: And what can or should be done legislatively? There’s not a lot of time left, obviously, on the calendar. What do you think Republicans ought to do in the next month and a half or so?

Senator Rick Scott: We’ve got to show people we’re fighting. We have to take votes and show people we want to balance the budget. We want to improve the economy, right? We want to improve our immigration system.

Show people who we are. On election security, take a vote. I will take a vote every day on election security, every day. Say, “Republicans care about election security; Democrats don’t.” Every day, take the vote.

Guy Benson: And you can highlight some of those votes on the campaign trail. We know exactly how some of these candidates would vote if they get elected in some of these very key races around the country.

Senator Rick Scott of Florida, our guest here on the Guy Benson Show. Follow him at SenRickScott if you’re interested on social media. Senator, always appreciate your time.