Sen. Bernie Sanders wants the American public to own half of the country’s biggest AI companies. The Vermont independent outlined his proposal, called the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act, in a New York Times op-ed on June 1, targeting firms like OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI with a one-time 50% tax on their stock.
The mechanism is straightforward in concept, if staggering in scale. The government would take equity stakes equal to half of these companies’ value, deposit those shares into a publicly governed fund, and distribute the returns to every American. Sanders estimates the fund could grow to $7 trillion, which would make it roughly seven times the size of Norway’s Government Pension Fund, the current gold standard for sovereign wealth.
How the fund would work
The seized equity would sit in a fund managed by an independent commission, not Congress, not the White House. Citizens would receive voting shares, giving them a say in corporate governance, and the fund would ensure public representation on company boards.
At a 5% annual distribution rate, Sanders projects the fund would deliver approximately $1,000 per person per year. That money could come as direct dividend payments or be funneled into public services like healthcare, housing, and education.
