Ryan Baasch, a top White House tech adviser, has departed his post. Baasch played a critical role in devising the White House's National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence, a document shaping the future of automation and its impact on the working class. His departure, reported by Axios on Thursday, September 24, 2026, marks a personnel change within the state apparatus, but leaves the underlying structure of capital's technological agenda untouched.
The State's Hand in Automation
The "National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence" represents the state's active role in managing the technological advancements that directly affect labor. Such frameworks, crafted by figures like Baasch within the White House, typically serve to streamline the integration of automation into industries, often leading to increased surplus extraction for owners and intensified wage suppression for workers. The state, through its policy mechanisms, provides the regulatory environment for corporations to deploy AI, ensuring that the benefits of these technologies accrue upward. This framework, designed under Baasch's influence, sets the stage for how AI will be leveraged to optimize corporate profits, not to empower the working class or distribute the gains of productivity.
The development of AI policy by the White House isn't a neutral act. It's a deliberate intervention to guide technological development in ways that protect accumulated wealth and facilitate further capital accumulation. While the specifics of the framework are not detailed in the report, the very existence of a national policy for AI, devised at the highest levels of government, signals the state's commitment to shaping the economic landscape for the benefit of dominant industries. This ensures that the disruptive potential of AI is channeled into mechanisms that reinforce existing power structures, rather than challenging them. The framework likely addresses intellectual property rights, data governance, and ethical guidelines in ways that primarily safeguard corporate interests and market dominance for tech giants.
Capital's Enduring Framework
Baasch's departure changes little about the fundamental direction of AI policy. The framework he helped create remains in place, continuing to guide the integration of artificial intelligence into the economy. This framework will likely continue to facilitate the automation of labor, driving down costs for employers and increasing the precarity of employment for millions. The revolving door of advisers within the White House often obscures the continuity of policy that serves the interests of the ruling class. A new adviser will step into Baasch's shoes, but the mandate to create conditions favorable for corporate technological expansion will persist. The structural contradictions inherent in a system that prioritizes profit over people will not be resolved by a change in personnel. The "National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence" exemplifies the state's function: to manage the system's contradictions while preserving its foundations, ensuring that technological progress serves capital first. This policy, like many others, serves to manage the system's contradictions, offering symbolic concessions or regulatory oversight that ultimately prevent deeper structural challenges to the ownership and control of advanced technologies. The real power lies not with individual advisers, but with the economic forces they are tasked to serve.