“Winning the Race: America’s AI Action Plan” envisions a world controlled by all-knowing US technology.
It begins by declaring that “The United States is in a race to achieve global dominance in artificial intelligence (AI). Whoever has the largest AI ecosystem will set global AI standards and reap broad economic and military benefits. Just like we won the space race, it is imperative that the United States and its allies win this race.”
Released by the White House on July 23, the plan “identifies over 90 Federal policy actions across three pillars – Accelerating Innovation, Building American AI Infrastructure, and Leading in International Diplomacy and Security – that the Trump Administration will take in the coming weeks and months.”
In retrospect, it appears that the release of China’s DeepSeek AI model last January really was a “Sputnik moment.”
With 23 pages of text, the Action Plan offers a highly detailed assessment of what needs to be done to “achieve the President’s vision of global AI dominance.” It is a mission statement from an activist government, complete with an alphabet soup of departmental acronyms. For example:
“Led by DOD, DHS, and ODNI, in coordination with OSTP, NSC, OMB, and the Office of the National Cyber Director [ONCD] encourage the responsible sharing of AI vulnerability information as part of ongoing efforts to implement Executive Order 14306, “Sustaining Select Efforts to Strengthen the Nation’s Cybersecurity and Amending Executive Order 13694 and Executive Order 14144.”
That’s Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, Office of Science and Technology Policy, National Security Council and Office of Management and Budget.
Also, “Through DOL, DOE, ED, NSF, and DOC, partner with state and local governments and workforce system stakeholders to support the creation of industry-driven training programs that address workforce needs tied to priority AI infrastructure occupations.”
That’s Department of Labor, Department of Energy, Education Department (Department of Education), National Science Foundation and Department of Commerce.
Trump’s opponents claim that he is gutting the federal bureaucracy and wiping out decades of accumulated expertise. It seems more accurate to say that he is wiping out opposition to his policies within the bureacracy and changing it to suit his own purposes.
That is what we might expect from those responsible for the Action Plan: White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios, AI and Crypto Czar David Sachs and Secretary of State and Acting National Security Advisor Marco Rubio.
Krastios served as Chief Technology Officer of the United States and Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering in the first Trump administration. Before that, he was a financial professional and investor who eventually became Peter Thiel’s chief of staff. Theil was a co-founder of both PayPal and Palantir, the prominent developer of defense and intelligence data analytics software.
Sachs, who is also chairman of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, is a venture capitalist and entrepreneur who started working for Thiel prior to the formation of PayPal, where he became COO. He is a member of the “PayPal Mafia,” which also includes Elon Musk.
According to Krastios, “America’s AI Action Plan charts a decisive course to cement US dominance in artificial intelligence.”
According to Sachs: “Artificial intelligence is a revolutionary technology with the potential to transform the global economy and alter the balance of power in the world… To win the AI race, the US must lead in innovation, infrastructure, and global partnerships. At the same time, we must center American workers and avoid Orwellian uses of AI.”
“Orwellian uses of AI” – we will come back to that.
Rubio said, “Winning the AI Race is non-negotiable.” As if China, the European Union and others negotiate their progress in science, technology and entrepreneurship with the US.
The Action Plan has three main “pillars”: (1) Accelerate AI Innovation, (2) Build American AI Infrastructure, and (3) Lead in International AI Diplomacy and Security. To accelerate innovation, the authors recommend the elimination of red tape and the denial federal funding to states with regluations that “may hinder the effectiveness of that funding.”
“President Trump,” they write, “has already taken multiple steps toward this goal, including rescinding Biden Executive Order 14110 on AI that foreshadowed an onerous regulatory regime.” – i.e.. extending the roll-back of diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, as well as attempts to limit the influence of big tech companies, from the federal government to states controlled by the Democrats. The goal is to “Ensure that Frontier AI protects free speech and American values,” as they define them.
The authors also want to support next-generation manufacturing, invest in AI-enabled science, build world-class scientific datasets, prioritize AI skills in education and workforce training programs, facilitate AI adoption across society as a whole, and accelerate AI adoption in government, particularly in the Department of Defense.
To support next-generation manufacturing, the plan is to:
Invest in developing and scaling foundational and translational manufacturing technologies via DOD, DOC, DOE, NSF, and other Federal agencies using the Small Business Innovation Research program, the Small Business Technology Transfer program, research grants, CHIPS R&D programs, Stevenson-Wydler Technology Innovation Act authorities, Title III of the Defense Production Act… and other authorities… Led by DOC through NTIA [National Telecommunications and Information Administration], convene industry and government stakeholders to identify supply chain challenges to American robotics and drone manufacturing.
In order to speed up the rebuilding of US semiconductor manufacturing, the authors recommend “removing all extraneous policy requirements for CHIPS-funded semiconductor manufacturing projects” – e.g., collective bargaining, hiring based on social position rather than experience and ability, and other Biden-era priorities – in favor of return on investment.
All this will require streamlined permitting for data centers, semiconductor manufacturing facilities and energy infrastructure. The Action Plan declares that:
AI is the first digital service in modern life that challenges America to build vastly greater energy generation than we have today. American energy capacity has stagnated since the 1970s while China has rapidly built out their grid. America’s path to AI dominance depends on changing this troubling trend.
This means dumping the climate change-focused concern with energy conservation and zero carbon. To this end, President Trump issued an Executive Order last February that established the National Energy Dominance Council (NEDC). The order states that:
“We must expand all forms of reliable and affordable energy production… including our crude oil, natural gas, lease condensates, natural gas liquids, refined petroleum products, uranium, coal, biofuels, geothermal heat, the kinetic movement of flowing water, and critical minerals.”
The administration also wants to “Expedite environmental permitting by streamlining or reducing regulations promulgated under the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, and other relevant related laws.” Despite claims to the contrary, its policies are likely to accelerate environmental degradation.
In order to “Lead in International AI Diplomacy and Security,” the Action Plan states that the US “must drive adoption of American AI systems… throughout the world… by exporting its full AI technology stack – hardware, models, software, applications, and standards – to all countries willing to join America’s AI alliance.”
This means countering the AI governance and development policies of the UN, OECD, G7, G20, International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and other international organizations, which have too often “advocated for burdensome regulations, vague ‘codes of conduct’ that promote cultural agendas that do not align with American values, or have been influenced by Chinese companies attempting to shape standards for facial recognition and surveillance.”
Never mind that the best facial recognition technology is Japanese. All international organizations are suspect. Even the G7 cannot be trusted.
While promoting the use of American AI throughout the world, the plan also recommends expanding controls on exports of semiconductor manufacturing equipment from EUV lithography and other advanced technologies to sub-systems in cooperation with “partners and allies,” using the Foreign Direct Product Rule (controls on the sale of any product made anywhere in the world using American technology) and secondary tariffs to force them to cooperate, if that is necessary.
This is a carry-over from the Biden administration that reflects ongoing frustration with European and Japanese unwillingness to sacrifice even more of their business in China, which is the world’s largest market for semiconductor manufacturing equipment.
Trump’s current approach to semiconductor sanctions on China reflects both the ideals of the plan and objective reality. He recently lifted restrictions on the sale of both Nvidia’s H20 AI processors and EDA (electronic design automation) chip design software to China.
Pressured into doing this by Chinese restrictions on exports of rare earth metals and magnets, he satisfied Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, but also helped Chinese designers of AI processors.
Huang, who does not want to be locked out of the world’s largest market for semiconductors and who has arguably replaced Elon Musk as Trump’s chief technology guru, said:
“The reason why it was so important to get H20 back into the China market is that… 50% of the world’s AI researchers are in China, tens of thousands of AI startups in China. We want to make sure we have every opportunity to compete in that marketplace and win those developers, and when that happens… when half of the world’s AI researchers develop on an American tech stack, as the technology diffuses around the world and proliferates around the world, we become the global standard.”
In their AI Action Plan, Krastios, Sachs, Rubio – and, by extension, President Trump – see the promise of AI as virtually unlimited:
Winning the AI race will usher in a new golden age of human flourishing, economic competitiveness, and national security for the American people. AI will enable Americans to discover new materials, synthesize new chemicals, manufacture new drugs, and develop new methods to harness energy – an industrial revolution.
It will enable radically new forms of education, media, and communication – an information revolution. And it will enable altogether new intellectual achievements: unraveling ancient scrolls once thought unreadable, making breakthroughs in scientific and mathematical theory, and creating new kinds of digital and physical art – a renaissance.
An industrial revolution, an information revolution, and a renaissance – all at once. This is the potential that AI presents.”
Nvidia’s Huang is on the same page, declaring that “The age of AI has started. A new computing era that will impact every industry and every field of science,” after receiving an honorary doctorate in engineering from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology last November
As for the “Orwellian uses of AI,” the authors note that “Finally, we must prevent our advanced technologies from being misused or stolen by malicious actors as well as monitor for emerging and unforeseen risks from AI. Doing so will require constant vigilance.”
Presumably, the primary malicious actor they have in mind is China, although hackers, scammers and thieves come to mind, as does what “constant vigilance” might entail. In March, President Trump signed an executive order removing barriers to data-sharing across agencies of the federal government and Palantir has been hired to combine and organize that data.
This opens the door to a degree of surveillance that could be used to create an American version of China’s social credit system, which monitors and evaluates the trustworthiness of individuals and organizations in the eyes of the government.
It might seem, therefore, that Trump is trying to meet the Chinese challenge by adopting Chinese methods; however, China leads the world in renewable energy and electric vehicles, while Trump is throwing environmental protection to the wind.
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