United States of America: Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act was reintroduced to State House as HB 149 including testing requirements

On 14 March 2024, the Texas Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act was reintroduced to the State House as HB 149, superseding the HB 1709 Bill of the same name introduced on 23 December 2024. Unlike its predecessor, HB 149 does not mandate structured pre-deployment testing obligations for developers and deployers of high-risk AI systems. Instead, the Bill introduces a regulatory sandbox program administered by the Department of Information Resources and overseen by the AI Council. This program enables selected participants to test AI systems in a controlled environment without full compliance burdens. Participants must submit descriptions of system use cases, benefits, risk mitigation strategies, and quarterly performance reports. This framework aims to encourage innovation while providing limited regulatory oversight. It replaces HB 1709’s comprehensive obligations around adversarial testing, risk assessments aligned with NIST frameworks, and mandatory documentation of test results for private sector actors.