EU Talks Stall Over Exemptions in AI Act

Trilogue negotiations between the European Parliament, the Council of the EU, and the European Commission hit a stalemate over the draft AI Act, according to reporting by TechCrunch and Technology's Legal Edge. TechCrunch records MEP Brando Benifei saying talks were "complicated" and that parliamentarians would not concede on preserving fundamental-rights protections. TechCrunch also records civil-society concerns from EDRi's Sarah Chander about Member State resistance to several parliamentarian proposals. Technology's Legal Edge reports that negotiators failed to agree on the tiered approach to foundation models and that talks "broke down" on 10 November 2023 after larger Member States sought to retract that approach.

Technology's Legal Edge describes a previously proposed tiered regime for foundation models that would have identified the most impactful providers using criteria like data sample size, model parameter size, compute resources, and performance benchmarks, and tasked the Commission with a methodology to set thresholds. TechCrunch lists the negotiation flashpoints as:

• •proposed bans in Article 5 (remote biometrics and other prohibited practices),
• •the scope and robustness of fundamental-rights impact assessments (FRIAs),
• •exemptions or carve-outs for national security and already-regulated sectors,
• •registration and transparency rules for law-enforcement use, and
• •limits on exports of prohibited systems.

Editorial analysis: Regulatory uncertainty at trilogue stage typically raises compliance planning and legal-risk questions for providers and integrators. Observers following EU tech policy note that protracted bargaining over scope and carve-outs often leads to later-stage amendments that materially affect compliance timelines, documentation requirements, and cross-border obligations.

Industry observers should monitor whether the Spanish presidency or a future presidency relaunches trilogue momentum, whether the Council alters positions on biometric bans or national-security carve-outs, how the Commission responds to calls for a methodology to classify high-impact foundation models, and any formal compromise language on exports and law-enforcement registration. Reporting to date does not include a public, joint statement from co-legislators resolving these disputes.