The 10 percent cut to the grant programs, including the Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program, is a significant hit to our first responders.

I take this subcommittee's oversight duties very seriously. As we continue to see evidence of climate change, it is important for this subcommittee to focus on our Nation's preparedness for disasters.

I commend the Biden administration for seeking to help first responders. The new proposed OSHA rule to update the Fire Brigades Standard is designed to benefit firefighters.

Prepared Statement

The American first responder community is strong, and it deserves the utmost support from Congress.

I commend President Biden on last year's Executive Order on AI which put the Federal Government on the path of developing and deploying AI in a manner consistent with these principles.

Advances in AI will only make their job easier, so we must redouble our efforts to identify manipulated content and empower the public to identify malicious foreign influence operations.

Artificial intelligence is not new. The Department of Homeland Security and its components have a long history of trying to understand how to most appropriately leverage the capacity AI provides.

AI is also a tool the work force will use to carry out their jobs more effectively. It is not and should not ever be a replacement for people.

As we consider how to deploy AI to better secure the homeland, we must keep 3 critical principles in mind.

We must ensure that AI models we use and the data to train them do not reinforce existing biases.