Vice President JD Vance said Tuesday that U.S. artificial intelligence (AI) systems must not become tainted with ‘ideological bias’ and cautioned against coordinating with ‘hostile foreign adversaries’ on AI capabilities.
Vance appeared Tuesday at the AI Action Summit in Paris, where world leaders, top tech executives and policymakers teamed up to hash out tech policy and its intersection with global security, economics and governance. The appearance marked his first foreign trip as vice president.
While the Trump administration has signaled it plans to take an approach that favors deregulation of AI, Vance’s appearance at the summit coincides with recent attempts from the European Union to enforce harsher regulations aimed at promoting greater safety.
Meanwhile, the U.S. and the UK abstained from signing an international document at the conference signed by 60 other countries that aims to prioritize ‘ensuring AI is open, inclusive, transparent, ethical, safe, secure and trustworthy.’ It was immediately unclear why both countries chose not to sign the document.
Here is what is known from Vance’s remarks about the Trump administration’s priorities for the future of AI. First, Vance called for AI systems developed in the U.S. to remain free of ‘ideological bias’ and vowed that the U.S. would ‘never restrict our citizens’ right to free speech.’
That is because Vance said he trusted Americans to create their own thoughts and opinions, absorb information and exchange those thoughts in the ‘open marketplace of ideas.’
‘We feel very strongly that AI must remain free from ideological bias and that American AI will not be co-opted into a tool for authoritarian censorship,’ Vance said Tuesday.
Vance also pushed for a ‘deregulatory flavor’ to emerge at the conference while cautioning against the pitfalls of ‘excessive regulation’ that could hamper a transformative industry. He also vowed that the U.S. would back pro-growth AI policies.
‘We believe that excessive regulation of the AI sector could kill a transformative industry just as it’s taking off, and we’ll make every effort to encourage pro-growth AI policies and I’d like to see that deregulatory flavor making its way into a lot of the conversations at this conference,’ he said.
Other world leaders who attended the AI Action Summit include French President Emmanuel Macron, Indian Prime Minister Shri Modi and Chinese Vice Premier Zhang Guoqing.
Vance also issued a warning to other foreign governments about ‘tightening the screws’ on U.S. tech companies with international footprints, claiming the Trump administration would not tolerate such limitations. He also cautioned against working with adversaries who have ‘weaponized A.I. software to rewrite history, surveil users and censor speech.’
Vance said Tuesday that the U.S. will block such efforts, and ensure that American AI and chip technology is protected from theft and misuse.
‘I would also remind our international friends here today that partnering with such regimes — it never pays off in the long term,’ Vance said.
While Vance said that the U.S. wants to partner with other nations on this front, Macron said Europe could take a ‘third way’ approach in AI innovation and not rely on either the U.S. or China. Macron also called for enhanced ‘international governance’ on AI policy.
‘We want a fair and open access to these innovations for the whole planet,’ Macron said.
Vance’s comments coincide with some recent actions from the Trump administration to advance AI in the U.S.
In January, Trump unveiled a new $500 billion AI infrastructure project called Stargate, a datacenter joint venture between investment holding company Softbank, and tech companies OpenAI and Oracle that Trump labeled the ‘largest AI infrastructure project in history.’
The project includes an initial investment of $100 billion that is slated to grow to $500 billion over Trump’s term in office, and will build ‘colossal’ data centers in the U.S. to power AI.
The Associated Press and Fox News’ Michael Dorgan contributed to this report.