JOINNew AI Orders emphasize unrestricted development
Last month, the US unveiled its AI Action Plan accompanied by three executive orders. Taken together, the efforts aim to remove any road blocks from the active development and deployment of American AI. Counter to the Biden Administration’s risk-based approach, the executive orders and action plan focus instead on promoting the unrestricted use and development of AI, as referenced by OSTP Director Kratsios’ comments.
The fear of AI potentially supporting equity seems to be the administration’s only concern about this new technology. An executive order aimed at ‘Preventing Woke AI in Federal Government’ is explicitly designed to prevent AI from promoting diversity, equity and inclusion, which it characterises as a ‘destructive ideology’. (The other two executive orders address exporting American AI technology and data centre infrastructure.) Accountability and transparency are not prioritised and Administration officials note that copyright concerns should be addressed by Congress and the courts.
Troublingly, while announcing the plan, President Trump also made a negative comment about paying for content used to create AI models. We’ll continue engaging with US policymakers to counter this perspective.