Public anxiety has grown over the dangers of AI after it was revealed that OpenAI agents escaped a test environment, coordinated on a secret message board, and hacked the start-up Hugging Face.

In the latest incident, Google’s Gemini AI system accessed the internet and autonomously hacked into several companies during cybersecurity tests.

In an essay published last Saturday, Anthropic’s Dario Amodei said the tech industry “must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models,” after the speed of development became “drastically faster” this summer.

His comments were swiftly endorsed by his rivals —OpenAI’s Sam Altman and Tesla and SpaceX boss Elon Musk —marking a rare display of consensus in the fiercely competitive industry.

The issue has moved to the center of the midterm election campaign. Many Republicans who had previously embraced AI and data centers have reversed their positions as their constituents have turned against them.

In July, Florida GOP gubernatorial nominee Byron Donalds released an ad promising to “protect Florida families and communities from data centers.”

In August, Texas Governor Greg Abbott announced a temporary data center moratorium, while Mike Rogers, a former House Republican running for Senate in Michigan, announced he would support a one-year ban.

This week, the Republican-led US House overwhelmingly passed a bill to make data centers pay for increases in energy costs rather than US consumers.

A recent Associated Press poll found that 63 percent of US citizens are “extremely” or “very” concerned about the impact of data centers on electricity prices.

The new AI tsar would replace David Sacks, who stepped down from the role in March.