Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) has proposed a remittance tax on certain artificial intelligence companies amounting to 50% of the company’s outstanding equity interests. Sanders says these equity interests could be used to establish a sovereign wealth fund, with annual direct payment distributions to Americans.
Sanders shared details of the proposal, dubbed the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act, in a June 18 press release.
He previewed the effort in Senate floor remarks weeks earlier. “Since AI is built on the collective knowledge of humanity, the wealth it generates must benefit humanity,” Sanders said on June 1. He described his proposal as imposiAIng a “one-time, 50-percent tax not on the profits of the largest AI companies in the United States but something that is far more valuable than that: the stock.”
Bill unveiled
Legislative text shared June 18 detailed who would be subject to the tax, as well as the logistics of the sovereign wealth fund.
The tax would apply to companies engaged in AI trades or businesses where gross receipts from these activities exceed $200 million. The term “AI trades or businesses” is defined to include AI data centers, AI computing infrastructure, AI services, and advanced robotics.
The term “AI services” is specifically defined to include development, distribution, and sale of an AI model trained using computing power over a set threshold — with that threshold adjusted annually by the Commerce secretary to account for technological developments.
The remittance would comprise equity interests, which for a corporation, would mean stock. For a partnership, the remittance would consist of a capital or profits interest.
Standard failure to file penalties under IRC § 6651 would not apply. Rather, AI companies that fail to remit the tax would be subject to a $1 million penalty on top of the remittance owed.
Parsing out U.S. AI activities for tax purposes
The bill also details how the tax would be assessed to capture domestic AI activities.
AI companies would be required to “structurally separate” from non-AI components of a business. That would entail adopting a new operating structure where the AI company does not hold equity in or provide credit to non-AI businesses, is not held by equity engaged in non-AI business activities, and does not share officers or directors with a non-AI company.
The bill calls for structural separation within 90 days of the date of enactment or the date the company meets the definition of an AI company.
In addition, the bill specifies when a foreign corporation would be treated as an inverted corporation for purposes of the tax and when an affiliated group would be treated as having significant domestic business activities.
Precedent for a sovereign wealth fund
Sanders stressed in his floor remarks that the idea of a sovereign wealth fund that gives the public a stake in AI companies “is not an original idea.”
He noted that OpenAI has also proposed a “Public Wealth Fund” with a stake in AI, while Anthropic has called for the creation of “national sovereign wealth funds.” xAI owner Elon Musk has called for universal income provided via government checks as a response to AI-related job displacement.
And sovereign wealth funds, themselves, are “common,” said Sanders. He notes the 100 sovereign wealth funds in countries around the world — including six in U.S. states.
In fact, President Donald Trump called for a sovereign wealth fund in a February 2025 executive order, with the stated goal of lessening tax burdens on families and small businesses and providing economic security in the future.
Trump, however, did not cite AI as a reason for the fund in his executive order, and appears to be acting more broadly. Tad DeHaven, a policy analyst at libertarian think tank the Cato Institute, described efforts of the U.S. government to control shares in steel, rare earth, chips, and other companies following Trump’s executive order.
DeHaven cautions that despite these actions, “no formal fund exists, and one cannot be created by executive order.”
In a more recent post, DeHaven warns that the federal government, as a regulator, cannot maintain neutrality if it owns a stake in AI companies. “It buys from them, taxes them, and investigates them. It can sue them, prosecute them, or even subsidize them,” he explains.
DeHaven views Sanders’ proposal as a departure from sovereign wealth fund models built from resource reserves, such as those in Norway and Alaska. Those funds comprise revenues from resources governments already owned or controlled, he explains.
He accuses the Trump administration of opening Pandora’s box with the February 2025 executive order — and calls for an unwinding of the administration’s positions.
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