Winning the AI Race Part 5: President Trump on the AI Action Plan
Speakers
Donald Trump
— President of the United States
Summary
President Trump speaks at the Winning the AI Race summit in Washington, releases the White House AI Action Plan and signs three executive orders covering fast-track permitting for data center infrastructure, promotion of American AI exports, and a ban on federal procurement of ideologically biased AI. He frames AI leadership as a race the United States must win against China, promising deregulation, one federal standard that preempts state AI laws, permissive treatment of copyrighted training material, and rapid approvals for data centers, chip plants and power projects. On energy he pledges an all-of-the-above buildout of gas, 'clean, beautiful coal' and new nuclear reactors, lets companies build and monetize their own power plants, and says he wants oil cheaper still at $64. He also recaps the Japan trade deal, NATO's move to 5% defense spending, tariff-driven factory onshoring and 100% capital expensing, and calls Nvidia's market position essentially uncatchable.
- White House AI Action Plan released, with three executive orders signed on stage.
- Pillar one: build the largest AI infrastructure on earth, including data centers, chip plants, power plants and transmission.
- Federal permitting fast-tracked; a single federal AI standard is to supersede all fifty states.
- Copyright stance: models should be able to learn from published material without paying every content provider.
- Pillar two: expand American AI exports of chips, software and data storage; the Biden diffusion rule was repealed.
- Energy plan spans gas, clean coal and new nuclear, with every company allowed to build its own power plant and sell surplus to the grid.
- AI power demand is described as roughly double current total US electricity production.
- Trade and industry notes: Japan at 15% tariffs plus $550 billion, NATO to 5%, EU funding US-made military equipment, tariffs pulling auto factories back.
Ideas
White House wants oil prices lower.
Trump states an explicit policy preference for lower crude prices. He notes oil is down to $64, says he wants to get it down a little bit further if he can, and openly acknowledges the oil companies may not like that, because the objective is very inexpensive electricity to power AI data centers. Combined with 'drill, baby, drill', fast oil and gas approvals in a couple of days, and new Alaskan and Asian supply deals, the administration is biased toward pushing the oil price down rather than supporting it.
AI demand doubles US power needs.
Trump says the AI builders told him they will need roughly double all the electricity the United States currently produces, which he found hard to believe, and he treats generation capacity as the real bottleneck for AI. He pledges to add at least as much electric capacity as China, which added eleven times as much as the US in Biden's last year, promises 'drill, baby, drill' and 'build, baby, build', gives every company the right to build its own power plant rather than rely on a hundred-year-old grid and to sell excess power back into the grid for profit, and cites $92 billion of Pennsylvania energy and data center projects including what will soon be the largest natural gas power plant in North America.
Tariffs and tax breaks boost US carmaking.
Trump argues US car production is set to expand sharply. Automobile factories are moving into the country at record speed specifically to avoid tariffs; he terminated the California car emissions rules, which he says added thousands of dollars per vehicle and made production almost impossible; and the new tax bill lets buyers deduct the interest on car loans, which he calls a very big thing for the automobile industry. He claims the US lost almost 50% of its auto business to Mexico, Canada, Europe and Asia and that within a few years America will build more cars than ever in its history.
Nvidia's lead is effectively uncatchable.
Trump says that when he explored breaking up the dominant AI chip company he was told Nvidia holds 100% of its market and that even the greatest minds working together would need at least ten years to catch it, and only if Nvidia were run totally incompetently from now on. He therefore abandoned the antitrust idea, publicly praises Jensen Huang, and endorses Nvidia's commitment to invest $500 billion in the United States over the next four years as a good investment. His whole AI Action Plan is built around building far more domestic AI infrastructure, which runs on that company's hardware.
European rearmament money flows to US defense.
Trump describes a deal under which the European Union pays the United States 100% of the cost of all military equipment, which is then shipped to Europe for distribution, much of it onward to Ukraine, in contrast to the $350 billion the US previously spent itself. He adds that NATO members agreed at the recent summit to raise defense spending from 2% to 5%, which he calls trillions of dollars, and states that the money will be spent in the United States with American defense companies. That is a multi-year, externally funded order book for US defense contractors.
AI gets sweeping US regulatory relief.
Trump promises sweeping regulatory relief for the American AI industry as official policy. He wants a common sense intellectual property rule so that models can learn from published material without negotiating thousands of content contracts, arguing China does not pay for this and US firms cannot win while paying; he demands a single federal AI standard that supersedes all fifty states so the most restrictive state cannot set the national rule; he cites his ten old regulations removed for every new one; and he says foreign rulemaking in Europe and Asia must not be allowed to dictate product design. He also terminated the Biden order on woke AI. Less regulatory drag and no state patchwork is a direct tailwind for companies building and deploying AI.
Policy fast-tracks AI data center buildout.
The first pillar of the AI Action Plan is to use every tool available so the United States builds and maintains the largest and most advanced AI infrastructure on the planet: new data centers, chip plants, power plants and transmission lines. Trump signs an executive order to fast-track federal permitting, streamline reviews and expedite construction of all major AI infrastructure projects, and says the capital will come from the private sector, citing about $320 billion of data center and AI infrastructure spending this year from Meta, Amazon, Google and Microsoft and roughly $17 trillion of announced investment into the country. Permitting speed, not capital, was the binding constraint, so the physical AI buildout should accelerate.
Chip fabs and AI exports expand.
Trump says America needs new semiconductor and chip manufacturing facilities, but argues the Biden chip subsidies were the wrong instrument: cash-rich chipmakers do not need grants, they need permits and they need to avoid tariffs, which is why they are already choosing to build in the United States. On the export side he repealed what he calls the Biden diffusion rule, which he says crippled American AI exports and pushed partners toward China, and he signs an order directing Commerce and State to rapidly expand American AI exports of chips, software and data storage. Onshored fabs plus a reopened export channel widen the addressable market for US semiconductors.
Clean coal is policy-backed versus China.
Trump says the administration is unleashing all forms of energy including what he insists officials always call 'clean, beautiful coal'. His competitive argument is explicit: China is building 57 large coal-fired power plants and added eleven times as much generating capacity as the United States in the last year of the previous administration, so America has to compete and win, and the US has more coal than anyone. Coal is therefore protected and promoted policy rather than a fuel being phased out.
Nuclear buildout accelerated by fast permits.
Trump says he signed an executive order in May to rapidly begin construction of safe, reliable nuclear reactors and that he has cut the approval timeline to about one week for nuclear permits. He admits he used to have problems with nuclear but says what the industry has done is incredible, describing it as long-term, inexpensive and safe, and says the industry has been opened up under strict rules. He expects many of the AI and data center builders in the room to choose nuclear over oil and gas for their own generation.
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