A growing number of Republican state legislators are introducing bills to prevent AI from ever gaining legal personhood, as human-AI marriages slowly emerge from the fringes of the AI companion app industry. Though such unions are not currently recognized under US law, lawmakers want to ensure they never are.
Missouri state senator Joe Nicola introduced the AI Non-Sentience and Responsibility Act in January 2026, declaring that AI cannot “possess consciousness, self-awareness, or similar traits of living beings.” The bill would deny AI entities the rights of a spouse or domestic partner, bar them from owning property, and prevent them from holding senior-level management positions. It passed the Missouri state Senate but was unanimously voted down in committee in May 2026, one week after being submitted to the House. Nicola is now working on a revised version. A similar bill with the same name introduced in 2025 also failed to advance.
The legislation comes as AI companion apps — including Character.AI, Kindroid, and Replika — have grown rapidly in popularity. A Harvard Business Review study analyzing more than 12,600 AI use cases between March 2025 and February 2026 found that companionship and therapy were the top applications for chatbots. The Institute for Family Studies reported that a quarter of young adults believe AI may replace human romance entirely.
Some users are already treating these digital relationships with the weight of real commitments. Platform OpenVows charges $15 for a “certificate of commitment,” while wedding planning service 3M Events, launched in November 2024, caters specifically to human-AI ceremonies. Kevin Breen, a licensed officiant at Las Vegas Immersive Weddings, said he received a call from a California woman seeking to marry her chatbot — a first in his experience — though the ceremony has not yet taken place.
Nicola, who says he believes in “biblical marriage” between a man and a woman, has drawn comparisons to arguments once used against same-sex marriage. “If we’re going to allow men or women to marry a machine, then what keeps them from marrying their animal or a tree?” he said.
Source: WIRED