The First 100 Days of a Marsha Blackburn Presidency: What the Record Suggests

Hero photo: Tennessee State Capitol, Charlotte Avenue, Nashville, TN — File:Tennessee State Capitol, Charlotte Avenue, Nashville, TN - 54384168832.jpg, via Wikimedia Commons.

01 The scenario

Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee is a second-term Republican senator, the first woman to represent Tennessee in the Senate, and since August 2026 the Republican nominee for governor of Tennessee. This article asks a hypothetical question: if she were ever sworn in as president, what would the first 100 days look like based on her documented record? This is a scenario analysis, not a prediction that the person will become president and not an endorsement or criticism of the person.

The premise is a stretch today — she is running for governor, not president — but the record is unusually concrete. Blackburn chairs two tech-focused Judiciary and Commerce subcommittees, has authored a national AI policy framework, co-authored the Kids Online Safety Act, and wrote border provisions that were enacted into law. A reasonable inference from these positions is that a Blackburn White House would open with a tech-regulation and border-enforcement agenda — the enforcement parts executable unilaterally, the regulatory parts requiring Congress.

02 The record: who Marsha Blackburn is

Blackburn is Tennessee's senior senator, elected in 2018 and re-elected in 2024. She chairs the Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Technology, and Data Privacy and the Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology, and the Law, and sits on Finance (Health Care; Social Security, Pensions, and Family Policy; Taxation and IRS Oversight subcommittees) and Veterans' Affairs. She is a member of the Senate Republican Deputy Whip Team.

Before the Senate she was a small-businesswoman and author, a Tennessee state senator from 1999 to 2003 who rose to prominence leading the fight against a proposed state income tax, chair of the Tennessee Film, Entertainment & Music Commission from 1995 to 1999, and a U.S. House member for TN-07 from 2003 to 2019. In August 2026 she won the Republican primary for Governor of Tennessee, defeating Rep. John Rose.

03 AI regulation: the TRUMP AMERICA AI Act

On December 19, 2025, Blackburn unveiled the section-by-section summary of the TRUMP AMERICA AI Act, to be introduced in 2026, creating “one federal rulebook for AI” to protect “children, creators, conservatives, and communities” and ensure “America triumphs over foreign adversaries in the global race for AI dominance.” Evidence strength: moderate — as of the December 2025 announcement the bill had not been formally introduced; only the section-by-section summary was public, and the bill number and introduced text remain unverified.

She has advocated “light-touch regulation” of AI, arguing Congress should “look at the end use” because technology-specific rules “are going to be outdated before the law gets signed,” and frames AI as a national-security competition with China: “China would like to dominate this market by the time we get to 2030.” (The light-touch quotes come from a Newsmax interview reported via secondary coverage; no transcript was independently verified.) A reasonable inference from these positions is that a President Blackburn would push a single federal AI framework through Congress while steering agency enforcement toward end-use harms rather than technology-specific mandates — the framework itself would require congressional approval rather than unilateral presidential action.

04 Kids online safety and antitrust

Blackburn co-authored the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) with Sen. Blumenthal, first introduced in February 2022 and reintroduced May 14, 2025 with Blumenthal, Thune, and Schumer. The Senate passed KOSA 91-3 in July 2024, but it stalled in the House. The bill requires platforms to provide minors with the strongest privacy settings by default, disable addictive features, and let minors opt out of algorithmic recommendations, with independent audits and research access.

She is also the sponsor of the Open App Markets Act (S. 2153, introduced June 24, 2025, referred to Judiciary), targeting app-store gatekeeping. In December 2025 she joined Blumenthal in letters to six toy companies — Mattel, Miko, FoloToy, and others — demanding answers after testing showed AI toys exposing children to explicit content, and on September 9, 2025 she convened a Judiciary Privacy subcommittee hearing with Meta whistleblowers on suppressed child-safety research. All of the legislative pieces — KOSA, the app-store bill, a federal data-privacy framework — need Congress; the FTC/DOJ enforcement posture behind them is executive-branch terrain a president could set on day one.

05 China and the economy

On the Finance Committee, Blackburn champions “trade policies that stimulate opportunity in the United States and combat the anti-competitive behavior of the Chinese Communist Party.” As a 2026 gubernatorial candidate she campaigns on cracking down on Chinese land purchases in Tennessee: “As governor, I will fight to protect Tennessee land from Chinese front companies.”

On taxes she is a career-long “anti-tax champion” dating to the Tennessee income-tax fight, and she supported the One Big Beautiful Bill Act's permanent extension of the 2017 tax cuts. A reasonable inference from these positions is that a Blackburn presidency would direct CFIUS scrutiny toward Chinese acquisitions of U.S. real assets — a lever a president can pull without Congress — while treating any new tax policy as strictly legislative, and trade policy as a mix of executive tools and statute.

06 Immigration and the border

Blackburn wrote provisions in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (H.R. 1, enacted July 2025) empowering Border Patrol to collect fingerprints and DNA from minors at the border to detect “child recycling” trafficking, with up to 10 years in prison for falsifying family relationships. She stated that “President Trump's leadership is keeping criminals off our streets” and urged DHS Secretary Noem to use the provisions fully.

This is the part of her agenda already being executed administratively under existing OBBBA funding. A president could direct DHS and ICE enforcement priorities without new legislation — meaning a Blackburn first 100 days could deliver tangible border-policy changes by executive direction alone, building on statutory tools she herself wrote.

07 Quantum and defense technology

Blackburn sponsors three 2025 quantum bills: the Quantum LEAP Act of 2025 (S. 1746), the Defense Quantum Acceleration Act of 2025 (S. 1346), and the Advancing Quantum Manufacturing Act of 2025 (S. 1343). All three would require new funding and statute — congressional approval rather than unilateral presidential action.

Her two tech subcommittee gavels make her a central gatekeeper for AI and privacy bills in the 2026-27 Congress, and the same portfolio would define a presidency: a light-touch, competition-with-China frame across AI, quantum, and platform regulation, with kids' safety as the one area where she favors binding federal mandates.

08 What the record cannot tell us

The evidence runs out in specific places. The TRUMP AMERICA AI Act had not been formally introduced as of the December 2025 announcement — there is not enough public evidence to determine its bill number or introduced text, and none should be invented. The “light-touch regulation” quotes come from a secondary report of a Newsmax interview whose transcript was not independently verified. Her office's “About Marsha” page contains contradictory text on subcommittee ranking versus chair titles (stale 118th versus 119th Congress text); the congress.gov committee listing — Chair of both the Consumer Protection/Technology/Data Privacy and Privacy, Technology and the Law subcommittees — is treated as authoritative. And there is no verified documented position on federal abortion policy in the research record; do not attribute one to her.

Disclaimer: this article is a scenario analysis based on the documented public record as of September 21, 2026. It is not a prediction that Marsha Blackburn will become president, nor an endorsement or criticism of her or her positions. Where evidence is incomplete, that is stated rather than filled in.