Congress funds AI research for everyone—not just Big Tech
S. 4441 — CREATE AI Act · Filed by Todd Young (R-IN) · 7 cosponsors · Introduced Apr 29, 2026 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill creates a National Artificial Intelligence Research Resource (NAIRR) — a federally coordinated platform that connects U.S. researchers, educators, and students at universities, nonprofits, and small businesses to shared computing power, data, software, and AI training. The National Science Foundation will manage it, with a one-year deadline to launch. Eligible users get free or low-cost access; the program can charge fees but must maintain a free tier. Foreign nationals employed by adversarial countries are excluded.
Why we flagged it
The bill's core function is to establish and fund a shared national resource for AI research and workforce development, operated by the NSF as a public good. It is not a tax measure, deregulation, or private subsidy — it is infrastructure investment.
What the text implies
- The bill allows the NSF to delegate operational tasks to nongovernmental organizations selected through a competitive process, creating potential for private contractors to manage public AI infrastructure and data — the oversight and transparency of these delegations is not fully specified.
- Fee collection authority allows the NAIRR to retain and spend collected fees without further congressional appropriation, creating a self-sustaining revenue stream that may reduce future budget scrutiny and accountability.
- The exclusion of foreign nationals employed by 'countries listed in section 4872 of title 10' (likely China, Russia, Iran, North Korea) may create friction with international research collaboration and could affect visa/employment eligibility for foreign researchers at U.S. institutions.
- The bill mandates conformance with National Security Presidential Memorandum-33 but does not define what 'research security' restrictions mean in practice — this could be interpreted broadly to limit open-source publication or international data sharing.
Who it affects
The bill expands public access to AI research infrastructure that would otherwise be available only to well-funded institutions or private companies, democratizing AI skill-building and research across universities, nonprofits, and small businesses. This lowers barriers to entry for ordinary researchers and students and supports workforce development in a critical technology sector.
Who stands to gain
- cloud computing providers (AWS, Azure, Google Cloud) — likely to supply computational resources
- software and data platform vendors
- technology consulting firms managing delegated operations
- semiconductor manufacturers (indirect, via increased demand for compute)
Named in the bill
National Science Foundation (NSF), Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure, Office of Science and Technology Policy, Executive agencies, Higher education institutions, Small Business Administration, National Security Presidential Memorandum-33, William M. Thornberry National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021
Where it stands
7 cosponsors: 4 Democrats, 3 Republicans.
- Apr 29, 2026 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Apr 29, 2026 — Referred to Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
1 lobbying clients named this bill on 1 disclosure filings across 1 quarter, Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $510,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 4 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 0% of bills with at least one filing.
Todd Young, the sponsor, reported $704,220 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle. $5,000 of that came from 1 PAC tied to these lobbying clients.
- Cognizant Technology Solutions U.S. Corporation — $510,000 on 1 filing
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the full bill text on Jul 2, 2026; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
“Congress funds AI research for everyone—not just Big Tech” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/s4441 Report an error
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