The State of AI Legislation, by State
Which states are moving on artificial intelligence, which bills actually became law, and which died in committee — drawn directly from USLege's own bill-tracking data, not a secondhand summary.
By Laura Davis, Co-Founder & Chief Business Officer at USLege
Methodology: pulled directly from USLege's live bill-tracking database on August 4, 2026, using a semantic search for artificial-intelligence-related bills in each state's current and recent sessions. This is a snapshot across eight states with confirmed high AI-bill volume, not an exhaustive 50-state count — USLege's live platform is the way to see the current, complete picture for any specific state.
Every state legislature we checked for this report had at least 20 active or recent bills referencing artificial intelligence, the maximum our search returned per state, which means the real number in each is at or above that. Texas, California, New York, Florida, Illinois, Colorado, Washington, and Virginia all cleared that bar. AI legislation is not a coastal or a red-state or a blue-state story right now; it is showing up everywhere at once.
Two bills that actually became law
California SB 53 — Transparency in Frontier Artificial Intelligence Act
Authored by Sen. Scott Wiener, with Sen. Susan Rubio as coauthor. Passed the Senate 37–0, passed the Assembly 59–7, and was signed by the Governor on September 29, 2025 (Chapter 138, Statutes of 2025).
Source: California Legislative Information, leginfo.legislature.ca.gov, SB 53 (2025-2026 session)
Texas HB 149 — Texas Responsible AI Governance Act (TRAIGA)
Authored by Rep. Giovanni Capriglione with four joint authors and two coauthors, sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Charles Schwertner. Signed by the Governor on June 22, 2025, effective January 1, 2026.
Source: Texas Legislature Online, capitol.texas.gov, HB 149 (89th Legislature)
One that died in committee
Colorado SB25-318
Sponsored by Sen. Robert Rodriguez and Rep. Brianna Titone. Referred to the Senate Business, Labor, & Technology committee on April 28, 2025; postponed indefinitely by that same committee on May 5, 2025, one week later.
Source: Colorado General Assembly, leg.colorado.gov, SB25-318
The pattern across all three: real, credentialed sponsors, real committee process, and genuinely different outcomes within the same few months of 2025. That's the part a status dashboard alone won't tell you — you need the hearing record and the vote history to know why one bill cleared and another didn't.
Where activity is concentrated (this snapshot)
| State | Active/recent AI bills found | Notable outcome |
|---|---|---|
| California | 20+ | SB 53 signed into law, Sept. 2025 |
| Texas | 20+ | HB 149 signed into law, effective Jan. 2026 |
| New York | 20+ | Multiple bills active in 2025 session |
| Florida | 20+ | Activity spanning 2025 regular and 2026 special sessions |
| Illinois | 20+ | 104th General Assembly, active pipeline |
| Colorado | 20+ | SB25-318 postponed indefinitely; other bills active in 2026 session |
| Washington | 20+ | Active pipeline across 2025 session |
| Virginia | 20+ | Activity spanning 2025 and 2026 sessions |
"20+" reflects the search cap for this snapshot, not the true ceiling — every state listed returned the maximum results per query.
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