The Pause Movement Begins

In March 2023, the Future of Life Institute published an open letter calling on “AI labs to immediately pause for at least 6 months the training of AI systems more powerful than GPT-4.” Polling also came out indicating a majority of Americans understood the risk of human extinction from AI and were in favor of safety and regulation.

Prior to ChatGPT’s release in 2022, most experts believed human-level Artificial Intelligence was decades away, if it was even possible to build at all. ChatGPT made it clear the question was when, not if, and the answer may be “very soon.”

At the time, many figures in technical AI safety believed the public would not support proactive regulation on artificial intelligence, and the only path through was solving technical alignment.

The FLI letter and polling showed a new solution was possible: Pause. Shortly after, Holly Elmore organized the first AI safety protests in the US at OpenAI and Meta.

Going National and Global

In 2024, PauseAI US officially incorporated as a 501(c)(3) and began forming local groups across the country. Our first groups were in San Francisco, New York City, Chicago, Portland, Phoenix, and Washington DC.

2024 was also a year of international organizing, as PauseAI groups incorporated in The Netherlands, France, the UK, and multiple other countries. In May 2024, we joined a worldwide protest in response to the Seoul AI Summit, an international gathering of diplomats discussing AI standards, to call for a stronger AI Treaty. We also did our first lobbying, meeting with 25 congressional offices in Washington DC.

Growth, Media, and a Major Policy Win

2025 was a year of growth. We formed local groups across the country, brought our message of AI safety to mainstream media, and strengthened our internal operations to support coordinated calls to action like for our Global Treaty.

We also saw our first big policy win: pre-emption. Tech lobbyists tried to sneak a provision into the Budget Bill which would make it illegal for states to regulate AI. When AI safety organizations like PauseAI learned about this, we joined together and moved Congress to action. When this provision was voted on in the Senate, it was struck down 99 to 1. Our government listened, and we won.

2025 also saw the first major AI safety law focused on catastrophic risks: SB 53. This requires frontier AI companies to proactively define a safety plan and stick to it.

As Seen In

PauseCon DC and We’re Just Getting Started

In 2026 we held our biggest event yet: PauseCon DC. Volunteers from across the country traveled to Washington DC to meet in person with their representatives. We held 74 congressional meetings over 2 days with Senators, Congressmen, and their staff.

And we’re just getting started. Join us and help pause dangerous AI today.