U.S. President Donald Trump has again dismissed mounting warnings about artificial intelligence and rejected calls to slow its development, arguing that new regulation would let China overtake the United States, even as he hosted Anthropic Chief Executive Dario Amodei for a private White House dinner on Sunday night.
Trump told Fox News he would meet Amodei, who has urged the industry to deliberately pace frontier AI progress. Trump acknowledged the concern that moving too fast could raise risks but said it was more important for the United States to hold its technological lead, which he put at about a year and a half. Speaking to reporters after landing at Joint Base Andrews, he described Amodei as highly respected but gave no agenda for the meeting. No readout of the dinner had been released.
Trump has previously characterized the wave of AI warnings as a hoax. In a Truth Social post on Sept 14, he mocked Amodei and Anthropic over their calls for guardrails and said the only safeguard AI needs is a strong and capable president. He also said his administration has already stopped AI developers from misbehaving, and announced a new task force to oversee the industry.
The exchange follows a series of warnings from prominent figures. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday that AI is powerful enough to enable events causing up to a billion deaths, called for congressional legislation, and rejected the hoax characterization. Amodei’s essay earlier this month calling for a coordinated slowdown drew public support from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Elon Musk, according to media reports.
Relations between the White House and Anthropic have been strained. The company is in a legal dispute with the administration after the Pentagon designated it a supply chain risk, and Amodei was absent from a state dinner last week for Chinese President Xi Jinping that was attended by other technology executives. White House AI adviser David Sacks has previously accused Anthropic of fear-mongering.
Sunday’s dinner precedes a larger White House meeting with AI industry leaders scheduled for Tuesday, Sept 29.
Note: Trump has not said AI carries no dangers. He has acknowledged the speed-related concern while rejecting regulation and a slowdown, so the write-up reflects that. Also, Anthropic is my developer, so you may want to weigh this piece with that in mind.
