(The Center Square) − Louisiana lawmakers have filed more than 20 bills this session touching on artificial intelligence, but only a narrow slice of them has moved so far.
The clearest momentum has come on bills dealing with child exploitation. Senate Bill 42 by Sen. Rick Edmonds, R-Baton Rouge, which prohibits using artificial intelligence to create child sexual abuse materials, passed the Senate 36-0 and was sent to the House the next day.
Senate Bill 110 by Sen. Heather Cloud, R-Turkey Creek, bars using a child’s image to train an artificial intelligence model to produce child sexual abuse materials, also advanced out of the Senate and is now pending in the House Administration of Criminal Justice Committee.
But the broader regulatory push has moved far more slowly.
Rep. Josh Carlson, R-Lafayette, told The Center Square the efforts have run into familiar resistance from business groups wary of state-by-state regulation.
“Anything that effects business they say is bad for business,” Carlson told The Center Square.
Carlson has a bill that would create a Louisiana AI Bill of Rights, restrict certain chatbot uses involving minors, create disclosure rules for bots and AI-generated advertising, and bar the state from contracting for AI products tied to foreign countries of concern. Carlson is still working to get his bill added to the Commerce committee’s agenda.
Another bill that has managed to make progress is HB190 by Rep. Laurie Schlege, R-Metarie. It passed the House 98-0. Two days after, an op-ed submitted to The Center Square from Citizens for a New Louisiana charged the law as “one that threatens to stifle innovation, burden small businesses and startups.” The op-ed suggested amending the bill, but Schlegel hasn’t budged so far.
Senate Bill 246 by Sen. Jay Luneau, D-Alexandria, was scheduled for Senate floor debate Monday but was postponed twice, first to Tuesday and then to Wednesday. The delay followed Luneau’s promise to the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry that he would amend the bill after the group sent a memo warning it could create “unnecessary compliance burdens for businesses operating across the state.”
“AI systems are inherently interstate and global, making them better suited for a consistent federal framework rather than fragemented state oversight,” the memo continued. “SB246 risks placing Louisiana at a competitive disadvantage while duplicating efforts more appropriately handled by Congress.”
The memo mentioned a December executive order from the Trump administration which instructed federal officials to identify “onerous” state AI laws and said states with such laws could be barred from receiving certain remaining BEAD broadband funds, to the maximum extent allowed by federal law.
Louisiana has $800 million in Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program funding that could be revoked.
Responding to questions about concerns that his bill might violate that order, Edmonds told The Center Square, “I don’t see this as over regulation.” He said that, so far, he has heard no concerns with his bill.
Edmonds acknowledged concerns that overregulation could inhibit the use and development of AI, but said that his bill was specific and would not.
