Scaling Laws
Lawfare & University of Texas Law School
Scaling Laws explores (and occasionally answers) the questions that keep OpenAI’s policy team up at night, the ones that motivate legislators to host hearings on AI and draft new AI bills, and the ones that are top of mind for tech-savvy law and policy students. Co-hosts Alan Rozenshtein, Professor at Minnesota Law and Research Director at Lawfare, and Kevin Frazier, AI Innovation and Law Fellow at the University of Texas and Senior Editor at Lawfare, dive into the intersection of AI, innovation policy, and the law through regular interviews with the folks deep in the weeds of developing, regulating, and adopting AI. They also provide regular rapid-response analysis of breaking AI governance news. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
Mentioned books
Mar 27, 2026 • 40min
Should AI Laws Be Subject To A Higher Standard? The Right to Compute with Kendall Cotton
Kendall Cotton, founder and CEO of Montana’s Frontier Institute and former state policy advisor, talks about Montana’s Right to Compute Act. He explains treating access to computing as a protected right. They explore how the law applies to data centers, software, and 3D printing. They also discuss strict scrutiny as the legal standard and efforts to export the model to other states.
Mar 24, 2026 • 50min
Why Data Governance Is the Key to AI Biosecurity, with Jassi Pannu and Doni Bloomfield
Doni Bloomfield, Fordham law professor specializing in biotechnology regulation and biosecurity policy. Jassi Pannu, Johns Hopkins public health professor focused on biological data governance. They discuss why governing sensitive biological datasets matters. They outline a tiered Biosecurity Data Levels framework, distinguish general-purpose AI from biology-specific models, and debate paths for U.S. policy and international coordination.
14 snips
Mar 21, 2026 • 25min
Rapid Response Pod: Trump's New AI Framework with Helen Toner & Dean Ball
Helen Toner, AI policy and national security expert at CSET, and Dean Ball, technology policy strategist at the Foundation for American Innovation, break down the White House's new AI framework. They compare its scope and wording to other proposals. They debate frontier-model risks, federal vs state regulation, procurement as a lever, and the chances Congress will act soon.
Mar 17, 2026 • 53min
Is AI a Death Sentence for Civic Institutions?, with Jessica Silbey and Woodrow Hartzog
Woodrow Hartzog, a law professor specializing in privacy and tech, and Jessica Silbey, a law professor focused on institutions and technology, discuss how AI reshapes civic institutions. They explore institutional theory, technological affordances, AI’s effects on expertise and skill atrophy, legitimacy and reason-giving in law, and argue for bespoke, institution-specific AI and precautionary governance.
27 snips
Mar 13, 2026 • 46min
Can AI Enable Human Agency?, with Tomicah Tillemann
Tomicah Tilleman, President of Project Liberty and former venture policy leader, outlines strategies to restore user control and data portability in an AI-driven world. He discusses risks of repeating the attention-economy, the promise of an intention economy, the need for interoperable, sovereign agents, and how policy and design must align to enable human agency.
Mar 10, 2026 • 58min
Live from Ashby: Taking a Long View on AI Governance with Austin Carson and Caleb Watney
Austin Carson, founder of Seed AI and regional AI builder, discusses public compute access and place-based adoption. Caleb Watney, policy researcher at the Institute for Progress, highlights meta‑science and team-focused funding. They talk about public compute infrastructure, immigration’s role in innovation, diversifying science funding, and making long-term institutional reforms politically viable.
23 snips
Mar 6, 2026 • 58min
Scaling Laws x AI Summer: Who Controls the Machine God?
Timothy B. Lee, journalist and AI policy analyst, and Dean Ball, AI policy advocate and former administration official, join to dissect the Anthropic–Pentagon standoff. They trace the supply-chain designation, debate legal authority and market fallout. Short takes cover personality and politics, OpenAI’s competing deal, public concern about surveillance and weapons, and what government–industry relations should look like.
40 snips
Mar 3, 2026 • 46min
In Defense of Optimism with Packy McCormick
Packy McCormick, founder of Not Boring and Not Boring Capital, is a writer-investor known for deep research and optimistic takes on tech. He talks about the power of narratives in technology. He explains why deep reporting matters and how optimism shapes action. He explores AI’s practical role, moonshot spillovers into physical industries, and the case for permissionless innovation.
10 snips
Feb 27, 2026 • 46min
The Pentagon Goes to War With Anthropic
A tense standoff between Anthropic and the Department of Defense with a hard deadline and high stakes. Debates over whether companies or governments should set limits on AI use. Possible government levers like contract cancellation, the Defense Production Act, or labeling firms as supply-chain risks. Concerns about mass surveillance, lethal autonomous weapons, and broader industry fallout.
Feb 24, 2026 • 52min
Can AI Make AI Regulation Cheaper?, with Cullen O'Keefe and Kevin Frazier
Kevin Frazier, AI innovation and law fellow who studies AI governance, and Cullen O'Keefe, research director focused on frontier AI policy, discuss automating regulatory compliance. They explore how AI can compile reports, run model evaluations, and detect incidents. They debate limits like Goodhart's Law, the fairness of compute thresholds, and the idea of conditional "automatability triggers" to delay enforcement until cheap tools exist.
