House Passes Record 23 Bills in One Week; Legislative Counsel Has Not Read Any of Them

WASHINGTON— The House of Representatives passed twenty-three pieces of legislation last week, a volume not seen since 2002, after the Office of Legislative Counsel quietly installed an AI system in July to process the rising volume of AI-drafted bills that had overwhelmed its fourteen-attorney staff.

"We were spending more time fixing the AI output than it would have taken to write the bills ourselves," one official said, describing the pressure that led to the decision. The solution, described in a memo that four officials confirmed they did not read before signing, was to route all incoming AI-drafted legislation through a remediation AI configured to strip identifiable tells — including the phrase "Claude responded," which appeared verbatim in a member's amendment last quarter — before returning polished drafts to members' offices for floor scheduling.

The system has performed as specified. Bills arrive. The remediation AI processes them. Clean statutory text returns. No Legislative Counsel attorney has reviewed the substance of any of the twenty-three bills. The attorneys describe the arrangement as, in the words of one senior staff member, "moving again, technically."

The bills passed last week include three reauthorizations, a defense appropriations rider, a water rights amendment, and nine pieces of legislation whose sponsoring offices described to this reporter as "something technology" or "one of the good ones."

Fourteen of the twenty-three are now in conference committee. The conference substitute was drafted by AI. The minority objection was drafted by AI. The two AIs have not been introduced.

"It's the most the House has passed in a single week in twenty-three years," the official said. "We are reviewing our options."