Regulatory pushback comes amid widespread concerns at the pace of AI development
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Several tech leaders spoke with Donald Trump in an attempt to influence his stance on artificial intelligence regulation, according to a report.
Elon Musk, Meta chief executive Mark Zuckerberg and Nvidia’s Jensen Huang all reached out directly to the US President in recent weeks to share concerns about proposed oversight to the AI industry.
The efforts began following a proposal put forward by Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis on 14 July, The Wall Street Journal reported, which advocated for a new regulatory body to set standards for AI safety.
The framework was supported by Anthropic boss Dario Amodei, but Musk, Zuckerberg and Huang all reportedly pushed back in private meetings inside the Oval Office.
Trump has since shared his thoughts about AI regulation in a series of posts to his social media platform Truth Social earlier this week, describing the fears surrounding the technology as a “hoax” carried out by “traitors” to the US.
Any potential slowdown, he claimed, could give China the upper hand in the AI race.
“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades,” he wrote.
“We already have tremendous CRIMINAL and REGULATORY power over these companies. There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China.”
Musk, who runs SpaceXAI, said that leading AI companies should instead work together to test each other’s frontier models before they are released.
“So, you know, instead of grading your own homework, you would at least have competitors grading your homework and raising the alarm if they see concerns,” he said at the All-In Summit in Los Angeles on Monday.
Nividia’s Huang claimed that existing laws are sufficient to prevent the worst outcomes of advanced AI systems, despite Anthropic’s Amodei and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman warning of devastating consequences if proper oversight policy is not put in place.
”We don’t need any new laws. We don’t need new regulations,” Mr Huang said at Salesforce’s Dreamforce conference in San Francisco on Tuesday.
“If you build a product or a service and you’re not confident in its functionality, capability or safety, then don’t release it.”
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