WASHINGTON (AP) —President Trump says he alone is enough to contain rougue AI.
“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!” Trump posted on social media.
The president specifically said his administration has already stopped the AI company Anthropic “from doing bad, or potentially bad” things.
Trump pushed back against calls by tech leaders at Anthropic, OpenAI, Microsoft and others to have greater regulation of AI to ensure it is developed in ways that promote safety, address legal liability and preserve national security. He’s opposed such efforts and claims doing so could cause China to eclipse America on AI development.
“There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China,” Trump said.
Congress races to address questions over AI
House Speaker Mike Johnson says it’s time for Trump to “summon everyone together” and take the lead at the White House, rather than Congress.
“I think we need to go in a big room, close the door, and sort this out,” Johnson said over the weekend on CNN.
The Republican speaker is close to Trump, who has downplayed the risks over AI, and Johnson shied from Congress taking action.
House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries said his party puts a “high priority” on action and will address the bipartisan proposal for a so-called AI “Kill Switch” during their Tuesday caucus meeting.
“We should take decisive action now,” Jeffries said on ABC.
JD Vance says Americans should not be scared of AI
The vice president told reporters Monday morning that there are risks to any technology, but “I don’t think Americans should be scared of anything.”
Vance said the Trump administration is concerned about AI but wants to make sure it’s regulating the technology smartly.
“Personally, I feel a little bit weird about the fact that you have so many frontier AI tech companies kind of coming to the government and begging the government to regulate them. It feels a little bit to me like a bit of a Trojan horse,” Vance said. “So I think we just have to be careful about this.”
Schumer asks Trump administration for classified briefing on AI risks
As technology leaders have issued warnings in recent days, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer says Congress should get a “full accounting” of how the Trump administration is working to put guardrails around testing for AI models, what it is doing to prevent American technology from flowing to China and how the U.S. would defend itself against the potential for increasingly sophisticated AI-enabled cyberattacks.