Direct comparison
Stop Rogue AI vs Emergency Button vs Thune
Three 2026 AI-safety bills compared: chamber, mechanism, and status for Stop Rogue AI, Emergency Button, and Thune-Klobuchar.
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How do Stop Rogue AI Act (H.R. 10362), AI Emergency Button Act, Thune-Klobuchar bill (unnumbered) compare side by side?
The table below compares Stop Rogue AI Act (H.R. 10362), AI Emergency Button Act, Thune-Klobuchar bill (unnumbered) across 5 procurement-relevant dimensions, from chamber through closest nikolai element (casrai’s own unendorsed crosswalk).
Side-by-side comparison
| Dimension | Stop Rogue AI Act (H.R. 10362) | AI Emergency Button Act | Thune-Klobuchar bill (unnumbered) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chamber | House | Senate | Senate |
| Sponsor(s) | Reps. Mike Lawler (R-NY-17), Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ-05) | Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) | Sen. John Thune (R-SD), Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) |
| Core mechanism | NIST standards for agent discovery, inventory, provenance, and runtime monitoring. | Mandatory, developer-held emergency shutdown mechanism. | Catastrophe-prevention commitments from AI developers, including safety-testing provisions. |
| Status as of Sept 20, 2026 | Introduced Sept 15, 2026; referred to committee. | Unanimous-consent fast-track blocked by Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), Sept 16, 2026; not passed. | Draft circulated mid-Sept 2026; opposed by a coalition of researchers and 19 advocacy groups as of Sept 16-17. |
| Closest NIKOLAI element (CASRAI’s own unendorsed crosswalk) | Monitor (N6 · Mitigations and security) — a real match for the bill’s runtime anomaly-detection requirement, but only partial: NIKOLAI has no element for agent inventory, verified provenance or tamper-evident logging, so the discovery-and-control provisions fall outside any existing element. | Halt Condition (N3 · Thresholds and checkpoints) — conceptually closest to a kill switch, but NIKOLAI’s own element page calls this narrower: it targets governance pauses in development or training, not live-system termination. | AI-Model Review (N8 · Transparency and review) — maps loosely to the push toward mandatory safety testing. Because the bill’s own testing language is unpublished, treat this row as directional, not a claim about its actual text. |
Common questions
Common questions about Stop Rogue AI Act (H.R. 10362) vs AI Emergency Button Act vs Thune-Klobuchar bill (unnumbered)
Are the Stop Rogue AI Act and the AI Emergency Button Act the same bill?
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No. They are separate bills in separate chambers that happened to surface in the same week. The Stop Rogue AI Act (H.R. 10362) is a House bill directing NIST to set agent-discovery and monitoring standards; the AI Emergency Button Act is a Senate bill requiring a developer-held shutdown switch.
Has the Thune-Klobuchar bill been formally introduced yet?
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As of September 20, 2026, no formal bill number has appeared in press reporting. Draft language was circulating for feedback by mid-September, and a coalition of researchers and 19 advocacy groups had already written Senate leaders objecting to that draft by September 16-17 — far enough along to draw organized opposition, but not yet a numbered, introduced bill.
Has any of these three bills passed?
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No. The Stop Rogue AI Act has been referred to committee with no scheduled markup. The AI Emergency Button Act was blocked from a unanimous-consent fast-track vote by Sen. Rand Paul on September 16, 2026, and has no rescheduled vote. The Thune-Klobuchar bill has not been formally introduced.
Is NIKOLAI an official crosswalk for any of these bills?
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No. NIKOLAI is CASRAI’s own independent, unendorsed reference dictionary. None of the mappings above have been reviewed, confirmed or endorsed by any lawmaker’s office, NIST, or any AI developer named elsewhere in NIKOLAI’s crosswalks. They are CASRAI’s own reading of how each bill’s mechanism relates to an existing NIKOLAI element.
Why does this matter for research administration?
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The Stop Rogue AI Act's core mechanism — directing NIST to set standards for discovering, inventorying, and monitoring AI agents already running inside an organization — would, if enacted, reach directly into university research-computing environments, because the bill's own scope explicitly requires "federal contractors and agencies" to build these safeguards into AI procurement and deployment. Many research universities hold federal contracts alongside NSF/NIH grant awards, a different compliance track from grant terms and conditions — so a university's federal-contracts office, not only its sponsored-programs office, would be responsible for tracking whether this bill's agent-inventory mandate applies.
Going deeper
