Seventy House offices spent money on AI tools so they could figure out how to control AI tools. Democrats led the spending. Republicans probably used it too but didn't want anyone to know.
The headline says "broader use likely undercounted" which means staffers are hiding their ChatGPT usage like teenagers clearing browser history. They're writing memos about AI safety while asking GPT-4 to summarize bills they're too lazy to read. The irony writes itself but they made an algorithm do it anyway.
ChatGPT dominated early spending. Not Anthropic. Not Google. Not some scrappy startup with a deck about responsible innovation. The company everyone claims to fear most got the government credit card. Lawmakers are scheduling hearings about existential risk while expensing the same tool they say might end civilization. It's like hiring an arsonist as your fire inspector then acting surprised when he asks where you keep the gasoline.
Early 2026 means this data is already stale. By now the number is probably triple. Every junior staffer with a .gov email is regenerating responses until the output sounds like they went to Yale. The AI they're supposed to regulate is writing the regulations. The snake isn't eating its tail. It's billing the tail for consulting services.
Democrats led visible spending which means they're either more transparent or worse at hiding receipts. Pick your theory. Either way someone in Congress submitted an expense report with "ChatGPT Plus: $20/month" and a supervisor approved it without reading what it's for. Probably used ChatGPT to approve the expense report.
The tools are helping lawmakers "weigh regulation" which is Washington-speak for stalling until the next election cycle. They'll spend two years asking ChatGPT how to regulate ChatGPT, then vote along party lines on a bill nobody read. The AI won't be regulated. But at least OpenAI got seventy new enterprise customers who can't be fired.
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