Scams and public risk
A Reuters/Ipsos poll found that 84% of voters see artificial intelligence as a threat to American workers, while 57% said the Trump administration hadn’t taken AI risks seriously enough or at all. The results put job worries alongside a question of who should set limits on technology that the administration calls vital to U.S. competitiveness.
The nationwide online survey collected responses from 4,506 U.S. adults, including 3,526 registered voters. Its margin of error was 2 percentage points. The six-day survey ended Monday.
Concern crossed party lines. A bipartisan majority supported stricter government regulation of AI: 80% of Democrats and 61% of Republicans. Fifty-four percent said Congress hadn’t taken AI risks seriously enough or at all.
The poll found that 62% of voters believe AI could get out of control and threaten humanity’s future, roughly the same share as in a Reuters/Ipsos poll from August of last year. Fifty-seven percent said the U.S. government shouldn’t use AI to choose targets for military strikes, up from 49% in a Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in August 2025.
Workers and public control
Voters also weighed AI against other perceived threats to American workers. Sixty percent cited illegal immigration, 74% cited competition from foreign workers and 73% cited large corporations, compared with 84% who saw AI as a threat. The poll described concern about these pressures but didn’t establish their effects on employment.
Fifty-six percent backed limits on data-center construction. Support came from 69% of Democrats, 55% of independents and 43% of Republicans. The poll measured support for limits while the administration backs data-center construction as part of its AI agenda.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly supported AI development and data-center construction, arguing they’re vital to U.S. competitiveness. He has also said the U.S. technology industry could fall behind Chinese counterparts if his administration doesn’t limit the technology’s use and development. AI safety advocates say that argument is misguided.
A White House official pointed to Trump’s new task force and said it is responsible for ensuring “America continues to lead the world” in the technology. On voters’ employment concerns, the official said, “The Trump administration’s priority is to ensure that there is a booming economy so that workers have many opportunities and experience limited volatility from any short-term disruptions.”
Scams and safeguards
Cybersecurity expert Morgan Wright said skepticism, not sophisticated detection software, offers the best defense against AI-powered financial scams. He said adversarial states such as China and Russia use AI globally, while cybercriminals most often target ordinary Americans, exploiting personal vulnerabilities for quick payouts.
Generative AI tools can clear language barriers, write convincing phishing texts and make realistic voice and video clones. With a few seconds of audio, often taken from social media, scammers can imitate a family member.
California mother Deborah Del Mastro said a scammer cloned her daughter’s voice in a kidnapping hoax. “It’s my daughter’s voice,” she recalled during an interview on The CyberGuy Report podcast. “And she’s having a panic attack.” Del Mastro transferred more than $5,000 before she realized she’d been scammed.
Wright said urgency can lower a target’s guard and advised people to pause before responding to suspicious messages or calls. Scammers continually find ways around updated security features, he said, while detection software faces a moving target as models from xAI, Anthropic, OpenAI and Gemini change. Daniel Kokotajlo, a former OpenAI staffer who quit in 2024 because he believed the company wasn’t behaving responsibly, said jobs, human health and safety mattered more to most Americans than competition with China.