() President Donald Trump released a 28-page “AI action plan” as he seeks to make America the undisputed leader in artificial intelligence.

Trump headlined an event hosted by the “All-In” podcast and the Hill & Valley Forum on Wednesday, and spoke about the plan and signed executive orders regarding “woke AI,” data centers, and AI exports. The orders will likely expand on the plan, its limits, and its goals.

The plan marks a major policy moment for Trump, who scrapped former President Joe Biden’s 2023 AI order just days into office. The plan promises a more aggressive, America-first approach to technological innovation and limits developers from building so-called “ideological biases” into systems.

“Whether we like it or not, we’re suddenly engaged in a fast-paced competition to build and define this ground-working technology that will determine so much about the future of civilization itself, because of the genius and creativity of Silicon Valley,” Trump said.

Trump signed three executive orders that will include dealing with federal permitting and data center infrastructure to establish fast-track permitting, promoting the export of American A.I. models to promote American leadership abroad, and ensuring that the federal government promotes or procures A.I. models that are ideologically neutral.

“My administration will use every tool at our disposal to ensure that the United States can build and maintain the largest and most powerful, most advanced AI infrastructure anywhere on the planet,” Trump added.

Trump also said there can’t be one state that interferes with the AI use of other states.

“You have to have a federal rule and regulation. Hopefully you have the right guy in this position that’s going to, that’s going to supplant the states,” he said

“We need one common-sense federal standard that supersedes all states. supersedes everybody.”

What is in the ‘AI Action Plan’?

The 28-page AI Action Plan lays out the administration’s approach to the rapidly developing technology, putting forward more than 90 policy actions for “near-term execution” by the federal government. 

“This plan galvanizes federal efforts to turbocharge our innovation capacity, build cutting-edge infrastructure and lead globally, ensuring that American workers and families thrive in the AI era. We are moving with urgency to make this vision a reality,” said White House office of science and technology policy director Michael Kratsios.

“We believe we’re in an AI race,” White House AI and crypto czar David Sacks told reporters on a call Wednesday morning. “There’s a global competition now to lead on artificial intelligence, and we want the United States to win that race.”  

“AI is a revolutionary technology that’s going to have profound ramifications for both the economy and for national security,” he continued. “So, it is very important that that American continue to be the dominant power in AI.” 

The plan seeks to remove what the Trump administration deems as “onerous” regulations at both the federal and state level. This includes limiting funding to states over their AI rules, as well as tasking the Federal Communications Commission with evaluating whether certain state AI regulations interfere with its mandate. 

The framework also calls for a review of the Federal Trade Commission’s investigations launched under the Biden administration “to ensure that they do not advance theories of liability that unduly burden AI innovation.” 

“We cannot afford to go down Europe’s innovation-killing regulatory path,” said Kratsios.

“Federal agencies will now review their rules on the books and repeal those that injure AI development and deployment across industries from financial services and agriculture to health and transportation,” he added, noting they will seek input from industry as well. 

The AI Action Plan also directs the Commerce Department to revise an AI risk framework to remove references to misinformation, climate change and diversity, equity and inclusion, and calls for an update to federal procurement guidelines limiting contracts to AI systems deemed “objective and free from top-down ideological bias.” 

The framework separately focuses on boosting the development of AI data center and energy infrastructure. It seeks to provide data centers with wide-ranging exclusions from or permits for federal environment regulations, in addition to generally expediting permitting efforts. 

While vague, the plan appears to call for reducing scrutiny of AI’s environmental impacts. It calls for exempting from environmental review “data center-related actions that normally do not have a significant effect on the environment.” It’s not entirely clear what would fall under that category.

It also calls for fast-tracking “all” data center and data center energy projects under the nation’s permitting system and considering a nationwide permit to allow these projects to move forward despite potential water quality impacts.

And it says the government should make publicly-owned lands available for construction of data centers and related power plants, in addition to pushing for stabilizing the electrical grid and boosting U.S. semiconductor manufacturing.

It also calls for making federal land available to build data centers and the necessary power generation infrastructure. 

The final key prong of the administration’s AI Action Plan is boosting the global adoption of American AI systems, including expanding efforts to export U.S. technology, countering Chinese influence in international AI governance and strengthening export controls.

“Having American AI models at the top of leaderboards won’t win the AI race alone,” Kratsios said. “Winning the race comes from those models being used by Americans and the rest of the world. American AI must be the gold standard.”

The AI framework largely aligns with the administration’s earlier moves on AI. Vice President Vance slammed “excessive regulation” in favor of innovation during his first international trip in January, as Trump rescinded former Biden’s executive order focused on AI guardrails. 

Trump has also heavily emphasized the AI infrastructure buildout in his first six months in office, announcing the $500 billion Stargate project with OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle in January. He touted another $92 billion in private data center and energy investments last week in Pennsylvania. 

Will Trump’s AI plan affect American jobs and data privacy?

In April, the White House received more than 10,000 public comments on the plan, with tech giants like Google, OpenAI, Meta and Amazon weighing in. 

spoke with two AI leaders one a startup founder and the other an AI masterclass professor at New York University and both agreed the goal is to secure U.S. dominance in AI as the race with China heats up.

Mohammed Nasir, CEO of AI startup General Agency, told the White House’s plan is “definitely important for American competitiveness.”

“Other countries, particularly China, do not have a lot of the restrictions that have been slowing down development up until this point, and lifting restrictions and lifting these roadworks definitely allow AI to move much faster and remain globally competitive,” Nasir said.

Ed Watal, NYU professor and co-founder of World Digital Governance, said it makes sense to continue expanding on American AI innovation.

“Of course, we’re making large infrastructure investments in projects like Stargate and several others, but also we built this,” Watal said. “ChatGPT was built, you know, in the U.S. So, there’s no reason we can’t stay competitive.”

A new AI policy could lead to short-term job losses, especially in administration or repetitive roles.

OpenAI’s Sam Altman told Congress this week that AI will disrupt millions of jobs, but he said the focus moving forward should be on helping workers adapt, not slowing down the technology.

Nasir agreed. “There’s going to be some job loss in the near term, but I wouldn’t say that we, as a society, have run out of ideas to create new jobs or create more meaningful jobs,” he said.

He compared it to the rise of the computer and said that tech innovation led to more specialized jobs.

“You didn’t have people manually tabulating data anymore. What happened immediately was that they started becoming more like computer specialists, and they just took on new roles, more meaningful roles,” Nasir said. “I think the same thing is going to happen with AI.”

But Watal also emphasized that AI safety hinges on enforcement, not just policy.

“We are definitely moving too fast without guardrails …” he said. “What is important is much like the bowling alley we need guardrails so things stay in the lane, and you get the strike every time you hit.”

partner The Hill contributed to this report.