Trump doubles down on AI as Beijing says ‘slow roll’ plans are ‘Cold War playbook’ to ‘curb’ Chinese development

On Monday, Trump took to Truth Social to voice concerns over a call from Amodei to "pace the frontier" with AI in order to slow down and regulate the large tech companies more.

Trump posted, "The only control or 'guardrails' that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the USA has that, in spades! 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' - and we will continue to do so! 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. WHOEVER WINS AI, WINS! We are leading China, and all others, and will continue to do so. Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE! Thank you for your attention to this matter!"

In a follow-up post, the president said, "The only reason the AI/Data Center outburst is happening is because the United States is leading, by a lot, every other country. Don’t kill the Golden Goose!"

He later said, "Concerning AI, when, in the History of Business, did anyone see the Leaders of an Industry call for Regulation that, if strongly implemented, will drive them into oblivion and bankruptcy?" he compared worries about AI taking over the world to a hoax and then added, "President Xi, of China, just announced that China will be doing absolutely nothing to stand in the way of AI, or its future."

After Amodei called for a slowdown of AI, China also blasted the calls from Amodei to slow down AI development. On Monday, Beijing said that the call to slow down the technology is "fearmongering" over the technology and likened the calls to a "Cold War playbook" in the AI industry.

“Fearmongering, confrontation and malicious competition will only disrupt the process of global AI governance and serve no one’s interests,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun told reporters about the calls to slow down AI. In the China-government-run Global Times newspaper, the proposal for the slowdown was said to be “packed with containment provisions targeting China and is, in essence, a ‘Cold War playbook’ for the AI sector."

The state-run media added that the effort is an "attempt to curb China's AI development through technological barriers and regulatory monopolies, uphold Washington's monopolistic hegemony in cutting-edge technology, and ​exclude China from the global AI governance system."