President Donald Trump on Monday rejected calls for tighter regulation of artificial intelligence and said the United States already has strong powers to police AI companies, even as leading industry figures warned that the technology could go badly wrong. The message was blunt. The people at the top want speed, control, and market dominance. The rest of society gets told to trust the apparatus.
In a Truth Social post, Trump attacked Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and wrote, "The people that say AI is going to destroy the World, and that Data Centers are bad for your neighborhood, are the same people that said, just a short time ago, that the World would be extinguished by 'Climate Change,'" He later added, "I'm right now breaking another Hoax — That AI is going to take over, consume, and destroy the World, and that Robots will be marching into our Cities, and getting rid of us all!" He called himself the "Hoax Buster." The language was pure spectacle, but the power behind it was plain: the state lining up with industry, while ordinary people are told the risks are imaginary.
Who Gets to Decide
Trump also said, "Concerning AI, when, in the History of Business, did anyone see the Leaders of an Industry call for Regulation that, if strongly implemented, will drive them into oblivion and bankruptcy?" He claimed, "We already have tremendous CRIMINAL and REGULATORY power over these companies!" and added, "There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China." He said, "WHOEVER WINS AI, WINS! We are leading China, and all others, and will continue to do so. Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE!" That’s the hierarchy speaking in its own voice: competition between states, profits for firms, and threats for anyone who questions the race.
Trump's comments came as industry figures raised alarms about AI risks. On Saturday, Amodei published a blog post titled "We Must Pace the Frontier," arguing for slower development of AI models to "reduce the risk that something goes seriously wrong." Days earlier, former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon quit his job and warned that the technology could "kill us all by the end of the decade," while accusing both OpenAI and Anthropic of "gambling with our lives." Those are the voices from inside the machine, and they’re not exactly soothing.
The People at the Bottom Pay First
Other tech CEOs, including OpenAI chief Sam Altman and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, over the weekend said they agreed with calls to pace the development of AI models. CNBC said Trump later blamed the AI "outburst" on America's success, saying, "Don't kill the Golden Goose!" The golden goose, in this case, is a system that asks everyone else to absorb the risk while executives and politicians argue over who gets to own the future.
The Trump administration has broadly encouraged rapid AI growth and the development of controversial data centers in the United States as it seeks a technological edge over China. Trump said on Saturday, "We're leading China in AI." He added, "And frankly, I want to keep it that way, because whoever wins AI wins." The logic is familiar. Push faster, centralize more, and call it progress.
White House AI czar David Sacks also pushed back on AI fears in an X post after Amodei's warning, writing, "Stop pretending the motivation to slow down is purely altruistic," and saying, "You face massive product-liability exposure if your products enable a truly damaging cyberattack. The market already punishes models that behave in unpredictable or unauthorized ways." Sacks added that China would be "very unlikely" to join a global agreement to regulate the technology. So the answer from the top is still the same: let the market sort it out, even when the market is the thing driving the danger.
Reform Delayed, Power Intact
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said on Sunday that Congress did not need to rush to regulate AI. "If Congress just races in and does some sort of emergency session to try to regulate AI, we will lose the race to China, that is a threat to every single American," Johnson told CNN's "State of the Union." He added, "We don't need everybody to panic right now, we need to handle this new technology like we have others in the past, and make sure we're doing everything we can responsibly to also not smother American innovation." That’s the election-season script: delay, defer, and promise responsibility while the machinery keeps moving.
CNBC said any attempt at AI regulation by Congress appeared highly unlikely before the Nov. 3 midterm elections, with House members set to leave town Thursday and remain in their districts through October. The calendar does what the lawmakers won’t. It pushes real action out of reach.
CNBC also reported that OpenAI chief Sam Altman reportedly met backstage with Trump at the Republican midterm convention in Dallas on Thursday, according to a Monday report by MS NOW citing three people familiar with the meeting. Anthropic did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Trump's post. The bosses and the politicians keep their doors open to each other. Everyone else gets the press release and the risk.