The following is the transcript of the interview with Rep. Ro Khanna, Democrat of California, that aired on "Face the Nation with Margaret Brennan" on Sept. 20, 2026.
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We begin today with California Congressman Ro Khanna, who is the top Democrat on the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, and he joins us from Fremont.
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You've proposed this idea that Chinese AI firms should cooperate with American companies.
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firms → propose → companies
You sent letters to DeepSeek, Alibaba, other firms, urging them to follow the lead of the American firms like OpenAI and Anthropic to slow the rate of AI advancement until society develops guardrails, as you put it.
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Have any of these Chinese firms responded to your proposal?
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any → respond → proposal
They have not.
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Winning an AI war is like winning a nuclear war.
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And what we have asked is that they agree to some basic terms.
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they → ask → terms
Look, there are two dangers to AI: either the loss of control or misuse, and the Chinese firms have taken no actions on either of them.
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firms → look → them
Well, I'm looking at what the FBI, the NSA, and Homeland Security, their division CISA, they have all warned that China-based AI companies are targeting and copying American artificial intelligence at what they describe as an industrial scale.
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they → look → scale
So, how can you ask competitors to collaborate?
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you → ask → competitors
Isn't it inherently at odds if they're stealing technology?
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they → steal → technology
Well, they're right that they are engaging in distillation.
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they → engage → distillation
Basically, they are copying American models.
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That's one reason, frankly, to regulate American models because they're copying them.
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they → regulate → them
Some of the safeguards would protect the world, but at the same time, we also need an international agreement with Xi Jinping to have basic standards.
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we → protect → standards
That should include international monitoring, it should include checks through the data centers where you can tell whether a model is being used for inference or training, and it should use enforceable and verifiable tools.
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Now, obviously, you can't just trust the Chinese, but like any agreement, like an arms control agreement, as Reagan said, you need to trust and verify.
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you → trust → agreement
And the world has done this before.
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There's no reason we can't do it when it comes to AI.
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Well, I'm looking at Bloomberg's figures.
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They report China is preparing to spend about $300 billion over the next five years to build data centers across that country, which will be operated by state-owned firms.
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which → report → firms
As you know, there's really no wall between the state and industry in China.
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you → know → China
So, when you are acknowledging they commit human rights abuses and their AI firms help the state to commit those abuses, aren't you asking the CEOs to- to do something that's at odds with what Xi Jinping is- is seeking to do?
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Well, the first ask is of Trump and Xi Jinping to come up with an international agreement, and two of the core principles should be one: banning any self-improving AI, recursive self-improving AI.
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two → come → AI
That's basically AI that continues to improve itself, and where we could lose control.
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The second is to have safeguards so that AI can't be misused by people for biological nuclear weapons.
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The letters to the Chinese companies were simply seeking information about what they're doing.
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It wasn't intended as a solution.
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What it was intended to do was highlight the need for the Chinese government and the U.S. government to come to an agreement, and that needs to be the first agenda item on the Trump-Xi Jinping summit.
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that → intend → summit
Well, we know it's going to come up.
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We just don't know the details of exactly what it is the U.S. is proposing at all.
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U.S. → know → details
We're going to watch for that in this next week-long set of meetings with China.
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You sit on the Armed Services Committee.
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Yesterday, President Trump posted on social media that his plan is to create an AI czar and form the "AI Force, much like I did the Space Force."
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I'm not exactly sure where he's going with that, but you yourself have called for a new government agency to be set up to deal with AI.
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agency → go → AI
So you both seem to agree that the existing infrastructure isn't enough.
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infrastructure → seem → ?
Why can't you just have Cyber Command handle all of this?
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What does the executive branch or Congress actually have to do?
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Well, we need to set up an AI agency like the FDA.
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we → need → FDA
…and 36 more, not listed.
The Aporia
