II 

118TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION S. 5539 

To require systematic review of artificial intelligence systems before 

deployment by the Federal Government, and for other purposes. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

DECEMBER 16, 2024 

Mr. WELCH (for himself and Mr. LUJA ́N) introduced the following bill; which 

was read twice and referred to the Committee on Homeland Security and 

Governmental Affairs 

A BILL 

To require systematic review of artificial intelligence systems 

before deployment by the Federal Government, and for 

other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Trustworthy By De5 sign Artificial Intelligence Act of 2024’’ or the ‘‘TBD AI 

6 Act of 2024’’. 

7 SEC. 2. DEFINITIONS. 

8 In this Act: 


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1 (1) ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE SYSTEM.—The 

2 term ‘‘artificial intelligence system’’ means a ma3 chine-based system that can, for a given set of ma4 chine-defined or human-defined objectives, make or 

5 inform predictions, recommendations, or decisions 

6 influencing real or virtual environments. Artificial 

7 intelligence systems use machine and human-based 

8 inputs to— 

9 (A) perceive real and virtual environments; 

10 (B) abstract such perceptions into models 

11 through analysis in an automated manner; and 

12 (C) use model inference to formulate op13 tions for information or action. 

14 (2) DIRECTOR.—The term ‘‘Director’’ means 

15 the Director of the National Institute of Standards 

16 and Technology. 

17 (3) FEDERAL AGENCY.—The term ‘‘Federal 

18 agency’’ means any Federal department, agency, or 

19 organization. 

20 SEC. 3. GUIDELINES FOR EVALUATION OF TRUST21 WORTHINESS OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE 

22 SYSTEMS. 

23 (a) DEVELOPMENT REQUIRED.— 

24 (1) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 1 year after 

25 the date of the enactment of this Act, the Director 


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1 shall develop and release a set of guidelines for eval2 uation of the trustworthiness of artificial intelligence 

3 systems. 

4 (2) USE OF EXISTING GUIDELINES OR ELE5 MENTS.— 

6 (A) IN GENERAL.—In carrying out para7 graph (1), the Director may use existing guide8 lines, best practices, or elements of guidelines 

9 or best practices that the Director identifies 

10 from other sources. 

11 (B) ANNOTATION.—If the Director uses 

12 guidelines, best practices, or elements of guide13 lines or best practices pursuant to subpara14 graph (A) of this paragraph in order to carry 

15 out paragraph (1), the Director shall clearly an16 notate such use in a central location and make 

17 such annotations available online to the public. 

18 (3) PERIODIC UPDATES.—The Director shall, 

19 on a periodic basis but not less frequently than an20 nually, update the guidelines developed pursuant to 

21 paragraph (1). 

22 (b) COMPONENTS COVERED.—The guidelines devel23 oped pursuant to subsection (a) for evaluation of artificial 

24 intelligence systems shall cover the following: 


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1 (1) The models used for the artificial intel2 ligence systems. 

3 (2) The data used and activities conducted in 

4 training the artificial intelligence systems, including 

5 the collection and filtering of data. 

6 (3) The processes and techniques applied after 

7 initial training to enhance the capabilities of the ar8 tificial intelligence systems, such as fine-tuning, re9 inforcement learning, and other post-training optimi10 zation methods. 

11 (4) Content generated by the artificial intel12 ligence systems. 

13 (5) The hardware systems used by the artificial 

14 intelligence systems. 

15 (6) Interactions between humans and the artifi16 cial intelligence systems that are expected to arise 

17 during intended or reasonably foreseeable use of the 

18 artificial intelligence systems. 

19 (7) Risks presented by anthropomorphic artifi20 cial intelligence systems. 

21 (c) ELEMENTS OF TRUSTWORTHINESS.— 

22 (1) IN GENERAL.—The guidelines developed 

23 pursuant to subsection (a) shall cover trust24 worthiness with respect to the following: 

25 (A) Validity and reliability. 


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1 (B) Safety. 

2 (C) Security. 

3 (D) Resiliency. 

4 (E) Transparency and accountability. 

5 (F) Explainability and interpretability. 

6 (G) Privacy. 

7 (H) Fairness and bias. 

8 (I) Such other matters relating to safety, 

9 security, or trustworthiness as the Director con10 siders appropriate. 

11 (2) PROTECTED CLASSES.—The guidelines de12 veloped pursuant to subsection (a) shall specifically 

13 highlight and consider accuracy and bias risks relat14 ing to protected classes under Federal law. 

15 (d) APPLICABILITY.—The Director shall ensure that 

16 the guidelines developed pursuant to subsection (a) are de17 veloped so that they include an assessment of the trust18 worthiness of all components covered under subsection (b) 

19 with regards to all elements under subsection (c), but ac20 count for circumstances in which certain assessment meth21 ods or recommendations may not be applicable to certain 

22 components or elements may not be applicable. 

23 (e) LIMITATION RELATING TO SYNTHETIC CON24 TENT.—Under the guidelines developed pursuant to sub25 section (a), the Director shall identify appropriate mechaVerDate Sep 11 2014 20:52 Jan 21, 2025 Jkt 059200 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\S5539.IS S5539

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1 nisms to manage the risks from relying on synthetic con2 tent or content created by artificial intelligence systems 

3 to improve a dataset or model, or to meet evaluation 

4 guidelines. 

5 (f) DEVELOPING ROBUST GUIDELINES.—The Direc6 tor shall ensure that the guidelines developed pursuant to 

7 subsection (a) are developed in such a manner that en8 courages transparency, cooperation, and collaboration 

9 with developers or evaluators of artificial intelligence sys10 tems, academia, and civil society sufficient to independ11 ently verify the elements set forth under subsection (c)(1). 

12 (g) ITERATIVE EVALUATION.—The Director shall en13 sure that the guidelines developed pursuant to subsection 

14 (a) cover how best to evaluate the trustworthiness of artifi15 cial intelligence systems iteratively, throughout the design, 

16 development, and deployment lifecycle of an artificial intel17 ligence system. 

18 (h) REPORT TO CONGRESS.— 

19 (1) IN GENERAL.—The Director shall submit to 

20 Congress a report on any expected barriers to imple21 menting and adhering to the guidelines developed 

22 pursuant to subsection (a), especially with respect to 

23 transparency, cooperation, or collaboration barriers 

24 with developers of artificial intelligence systems. 


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1 (2) FORM.—The report under paragraph (1) 

2 shall be submitted in unclassified form, but may in3 clude a classified appendix, if necessary. 

4 SEC. 4. FEDERAL DEPLOYMENT OF ARTIFICIAL INTEL5 LIGENCE SYSTEMS. 

6 (a) COVERED USE DEFINED.—In this section, with 

7 respect to an artificial intelligence system, the term ‘‘cov8 ered use’’— 

9 (1) means use in any automated decision mak10 ing; and 

11 (2) does not include any use that the Director 

12 exempts from any portion of the guidelines issued 

13 under section 3(a), including any use that— 

14 (A) is subject to evaluation by existing na15 tional security assessments; or 

16 (B) is an edge case, especially a time sen17 sitive or emergency case, as determined by the 

18 Director. 

19 (b) EXISTING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE SYS20 TEMS.—With respect to any artificial intelligence system 

21 deployed for a covered use that is in use by a Federal 

22 agency before the date of enactment of this Act, the Fed23 eral agency shall evaluate the artificial intelligence system 

24 deployment to ensure the artificial intelligence system 

25 meets the guidelines developed under section 3(a) not later 


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1 than 2 years after the effective date of this section or cease 

2 using the artificial intelligence system. 

3 (c) NEW ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE SYSTEMS.—The 

4 head of each Federal agency shall ensure that each new 

5 acquisition or integration of an artificial intelligence sys6 tem by the Federal agency for a covered use meets the 

7 guidelines developed under section 3(a) prior to deploy8 ment of the artificial intelligence system. 

9 (d) LABELING.— 

10 (1) IN GENERAL.—The head of each Federal 

11 agency shall identify as compliant, and make pub12 licly available, in accordance with all applicable clas13 sification requirements and national security restric14 tions, the documentation of evaluation status and 

15 compliance details for, each artificial intelligence 

16 system deployment for a covered use by the Federal 

17 agency that meets the guidelines developed under 

18 section 3(a). 

19 (2) NONCOMPLIANT DEPLOYMENTS.—Not later 

20 than 2 years after the effective date of this section, 

21 the head of each Federal agency that deploys an ar22 tificial intelligence system that is not compliant or is 

23 not evaluated pursuant to paragraph (1), shall— 

24 (A) make publicly available documentation 

25 of each such deployment; and 


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1 (B) with respect to each such deployment, 

2 report— 

3 (i) the status of the evaluation; 

4 (ii) progress made towards compli5 ance; 

6 (iii) a clear, specific justification for 

7 any delay; and 

8 (iv) any barriers to compliance, in9 cluding resource constraints. 

10 (3) REPORT TO CONGRESS.— 

11 (A) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 3 years 

12 after the effective date of this section, the head 

13 of each Federal agency shall submit to Con14 gress a report of each deployment described in 

15 paragraph (2). 

16 (B) FORM.—The report under subpara17 graph (A) shall be submitted in unclassified 

18 form, but may include a classified appendix, if 

19 necessary. 

20 (e) CHIEF AI OFFICERS.— 

21 (1) IN GENERAL.—Not later than 120 days 

22 after the effective date of this section, the head of 

23 each Federal agency shall designate a Chief Artifi24 cial Intelligence Officer, with responsibility for the 

25 management, governance, acquisition, and oversight 


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1 processes of the Federal agency relating to artificial 

2 intelligence, including implementation of the guide3 lines developed under section 3(a). 

4 (2) FULL-TIME EMPLOYEE.—To the extent 

5 practicable, each Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer 

6 designated under paragraph (1) shall be a full-time 

7 employee of the Federal agency on the date of the 

8 designation. 

9 (3) SENIORITY.—With respect to the Chief Ar10 tificial Intelligence Officer of any agency described 

11 in section 901(b) of title 31, United States Code, the 

12 Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer shall be an exec13 utive with a position classified above GS–15 of the 

14 General Schedule or the equivalent. 

15 (f) EFFECTIVE DATE.—This section shall take effect 

16 on the date that the guidelines developed pursuant to sec17 tion 3(a) are released. 

Æ 


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