- Bill Proposal: U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders has introduced a proposed AI wealth fund bill, with all effects still conditional.
- Stock Tax: The proposal would use a one-time 50% stock tax on the biggest AI companies.
- Public Dividend: Sanders estimates the fund could reach $7 trillion and initially pay more than $1,000 per person.
- Political Odds: Near-term passage faces difficult legislative odds, while startup-sector criticism frames the plan as hostile.
U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders has introduced the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act on June 18. As drafted, the measure would not make any ownership transfer, tax payment, dividend, or governance change active law unless both chambers passed it and the president signed it.
If enacted, the bill would try to turn part of large AI-company equity into a government-owned investment fund. Sanders’ proposal estimates the fund could be worth $7 trillion at current valuations.
A 5% annual dividend could initially top $1,000 per person, although near-term passage faces difficult legislative odds. During a press briefing, Sanders said: “What this bill does is not complicated.”
How the AI Stock-Tax Plan Would Work
Public ownership of the fund would come through a proposed one-time 50% tax paid in company stock by the biggest AI firms. Sanders tied the stock-ownership mechanism to a public-benefit rationale:
“The principle is simple: When a public resource generates wealth, the public should share in that wealth.”
U.S. Senator from Vermont Bernie Sanders
Shares would move into the fund, and a seven-member Independent Commission for Democratic AI, nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate from bipartisan congressional lists, would manage the holding. Stock ownership, rather than an ordinary cash levy, is what makes the proposal different from a standard tax bill: the government would hold shares instead of collecting revenue and immediately spending it.
Companies would fall under the plan once they cleared more than $200 million in annual sales from AI activities. Covered businesses would include AI data centers and advanced robotics, along with AI computing infrastructure and AI services. New AI companies would become subject to the proposed stock tax after reaching the same annual AI-sales threshold, so the bill would cover future entrants as well as existing large firms.
A mixed company with AI and non-AI businesses would have to separate those businesses so the public stake applied only to the AI operation. Under the proposal, the fund would not be allowed to sell the stocks. The bill would also ban using the fund to provide bailouts to AI companies, limiting the design to long-term public ownership rather than emergency financing for firms it taxes.
The released bill text had no bill number yet. Without committee movement or a broader coalition, the proposal remains far from becoming a federal ownership program.
Political Odds and AI Ownership Context
The legislative odds fit a longer Sanders AI-policy push. In March, Sanders’ earlier AI data center bill focused on safety, environmental impact, electric bills, and working-family benefits; the new measure shifts from construction limits to stock ownership in companies expected to capture large AI gains.
AI public-ownership ideas were circulating before this bill. OpenAI’s April policy blueprint already raised the idea of a public wealth fund model. June discussions about a possible government ownership stake in OpenAI kept public equity in AI companies in the policy debate.
But neither example indicates Sanders’ bill could be successful. They howevert illustrate why public claims on AI-company upside is no longer an isolated slogan.
Startup-sector reaction has been hostile. Y Combinator President and CEO Garry Tan called the plan a war on building startups in America. He said: “This is a war on building startups in America.” On X he then wrote, “Asset seizure is evil.”
In February 2025, a White House order directed officials to develop a U.S. sovereign wealth fund plan and evaluate funding, investment, governance, and legal structures.
Sanders’ bill applies that sovereign-fund concept to AI-company ownership. A bill number, committee action, or additional sponsors would be the first sign that lawmakers are treating it as more than a messaging bill.
