A sad day for America

Trump goes all in on Silicon Valley, leaving US citizens, and even his own party behind.

Moments ago, despite enormous opposition from both parties, President Trump signed an Executive Order that is designed to block states from regulating AI; since the federal government has passed almost no laws regulating AI, this essentially leaves AI unregulated in America.

Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar wrote a scathing critique of what Trump intended to do yesterday in The New York Times, (“State A.I. Laws Keep Us Safe. Trump’s Next Move Could Upend That”), but what is exceptional about this moment is a lot of the far right, from Governor Ron DeSantis to Steve Bannon to Senator Josh Hawley are also strongly opposed.

Indeed, in an earlier vote in the Senate, something very similar to today’s Executive Order was shot down 99-1. Some Republicans are apparently already looking for a candidate who is less tied to big tech in 2028. (About the only people who did want this executive order are big tech companies from Silicon Valley.)

My own hunch is that all this is going to blow up on Trump (or at least on his heir apparent J.D. Vance) badly.

Anything that goes wrong, from AI-fueled cybercrime to bioweapons attacks facilitated by AI to teen suicides apparently linked to GenAI will be on his hands, and his reputation. And because he has become so tight with Silicon Valley he will also be closely tied to any AI-tinged economic debacle that happens on his watch.

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As Adam Billen, Vice President of Public Policy at Encode AI put it in an email to many of us who have been tracking all of this, The White House is now “doing it [preemption via Executive Order] because they know they can’t get what they want in Congress.”

Whether the Executive Order survives constitutional challenges is another story, as LawAI’s analysis of a prefinal draft (not that different from what was declared today) makes clear.

If you live in the US and don’t like what’s happening — and don’t want to leave American citizens almost completely vulnerable to the downsides of AI — reach out to your governor and state attorney general, and let them know how you feel.

And go to the polls at the midterms. The opposite of overregulation is underregulation; here we now essentially have zero regulation. What we obviously need is something in between, fostering innovation but also protecting our citizens.

Instead President Trump has trampled over states’ rights and left our citizens in the lurch.