Washington (United States) (AFP) – US President Donald Trump on Monday attacked what he called a “sick conspiracy” against artificial intelligence, dismissing calls for guardrails despite warnings that it threatens humankind. Trump lashed out at the boss of AI giant Anthropic, who called on Saturday for a slowdown in the development of the technology. Trump said the United States needed to keep its AI lead over China.
Global tech stocks fell on the calls to hit the brakes on AI, which has fueled fears that superintelligent computer systems could go rogue and wipe out humanity by creating pathogens or triggering nuclear war. “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!” Trump said in a post on his Truth Social network on Monday. “WHOEVER WINS AI, WINS! We are leading China, and all others, and will continue to do so. Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE!”
Trump has pushed back repeatedly in the past week against the warnings about AI, which reached fever pitch after Claude-maker Anthropic’s CEO Amodei urged a halt in development. Amodei’s call to “slow the pace” was backed by OpenAI boss Sam Altman and Elon Musk, the SpaceX and Tesla boss who also owns xAI and was previously part of Trump’s White House team. But Trump trained his fire on Amodei, accusing him of playing both sides of the debate. “The Trump Administration has stopped AI ‘people’ from doing bad, or potentially bad, ‘things,’ like Dario (Anthropic!), who is now pretending to be a ‘perfect little angel’,” the US president wrote.
Speaking on Air Force One on Sunday, Trump said he had heard directly from tech insiders the previous week on the issue. Asked if he was downplaying their concerns, he said: “No, we are not downplaying, but you know it’s going to be more good than bad by a lot.” Trump has long portrayed AI as crucial for maintaining America’s technological, economic, and security lead over China, whose President Xi Jinping is due to visit the White House next week. China’s spy chief warned on Sunday that artificial intelligence endangers the country’s national security, saying foreign powers could use the technology to threaten social order.
Minister of State Security Chen Yixin wrote in an article that AI was now “the main battleground for global technological competition and a new track for major power strategic rivalry.” He singled out Anthropic’s Claude Mythos and OpenAI’s ChatGPT-5.5-Cyber for their advanced hacking capabilities that potentially “pose serious risks to China’s critical information infrastructure.”
Global concerns about AI and a possible extinction event have dramatically escalated in recent days. Britain’s King Charles III will host representatives of leading AI firms for a gathering in Scotland, a source close to the event said Monday, as the worries mount. The United Nations rights chief called Monday for countries and artificial intelligence companies to act urgently to rein in a technology he warned posed “unprecedented risks.” In a letter sent to countries and AI developers and shared with the media, Volker Turk cautioned that the world was “on the cusp of irreversible change, affecting not just us but generations of humanity to come.”
The head of French defense and technology group Thales also called on governments Monday to take responsibility for regulating artificial intelligence. Billionaire Trump and his Republicans have so far resisted growing calls to push through regulation, but there are signs of a growing backlash in the United States. US voters were already skeptical about the energy-guzzling AI data centers that he backs, and now Democrats are calling for Congress to set up guardrails for AI.
Vice President JD Vance, who has close ties to Silicon Valley, expressed skepticism Monday about the fact that tech bosses were now joining the chorus of calls for state regulation. “I feel a little bit weird about the fact that you have so many frontier AI tech companies kind of coming to the government and begging the government to regulate them,” he told reporters. “It feels a little bit to me like a bit of a Trojan horse.”
© 2024 AFP
