In the long arc of humanity's relationship with its own creations, Senator Bernie Sanders has placed artificial intelligence alongside the atom bomb — and then stepped further, suggesting it may surpass even that shadow. On a Tuesday morning in September 2026, the Vermont senator announced plans to introduce legislation banning superintelligent AI and imposing twenty-year prison sentences for violations, framing the moment not as a policy debate but as a civilizational reckoning. His warning arrives as a rare bipartisan unease stirs in Congress, set against a White House that has called such f