This week's Donald Trump AI Summit in Washington was a fanfare-filled event with The Tech Elite response. The president took the stage Wednesday evening. God's blessing was piped over the loudspeaker, and then he declared.
The message was clear – the technology regulatory environment that once was the focus of Congressional lawmakers was no longer like that.
“I've been watching for so many years,” Trump continued. “I've seen the regulations. I was a victim of regulations.”
When Trump spoke to the crowd, he called them “a group of clever things… brain power.” He was preceded by technology leaders, venture capitalists and billionaires, including Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and Palantir Chief Technology Officer Shyam Sankar. Hill and Valley Forum, an influential high-tech industry interest group, co-hosted Condeb along with the Silicon Valley All-in-Podcast hosted by White House AI and Crypto Czar David Sacks.
Called “AI Race Winnings,” the forum was an opportunity for the president to offer what he called the “AI Action Plan.” It aims to ease restrictions on the development and deployment of artificial intelligence.
The cornerstone of that plan is three executive orders that Trump has said will turn the United States into a “AI export power” and roll back some of the rules introduced by the Biden administration, including a guardrail on safe and secure AI development.
“Winning the AI race will require a new spirit of patriotism and national loyalty in Silicon Valley.
One executive order targets what the White House calls “wake up” AI, calling for companies that receive federal funds to maintain their AI models from “doctrines of ideological DEI and other.” However, the other two have focused on deregulation. This is a major demand from American technical leaders who have taken an increasingly bullish position in government surveillance.
One of them will promote the export of “American AI” to other countries, while the other will relax environmental rules and allow the federal government to allow power-hungry data centers.
Lobbying for millions
To reach this moment, tech companies have developed friendly relationships with Trump. CEOs of Alphabet, Meta, Amazon and Apple donated to the President's Inaugural Fund and met him at the Mar-A-Lago Estate in Florida. Sam Altman, CEO of Openai, who makes ChatGpt, has become Trump's close ally, and Nvidia's Huang united with the president on a promise to invest $500 million in US AI infrastructure over the next four years.
“The reality is that big tech companies are spending tens of millions of dollars on supporting curry with lawmakers and shaping the tech law,” said Alix Fraser, the Vice President of advocacy for the nonprofit.
In a report released Tuesday, the issue looked at lobbying spending in 2025 and found that the tech industry was spending record-breaking amounts. According to issue 1, eight of the largest tech companies spent a total of $36 million.
According to the report, Meta has spent the most of its $13.8 million and has hired 86 lobbyists this year. And Nvidia and Openai saw the biggest increase. Nvidia spent 388% more than the same time last year, while Openai spent over 44%.
Prior to Trump's announcement of his AI plan, more than 100 well-known labor, environmental, civil rights and academic groups rebutted the president and signed the “People's AI Plan.” In a statement, the group emphasized the need for “relief from technology monopoly,” which would “sacrifice the interests of everyday people for their own benefit.”
“Our freedom and equality, the happiness of our workers and families, the air we breathe, and even the water we drink, we cannot write AI and economic rules for large-scale technology and large-scale oil lobbyists. All of these are affected by the unlimited, unexplained developments of AI,” the group wrote.
Meanwhile, tech companies and industry groups celebrated the executive order. Microsoft, IBM, Dell, Meta, Palantir, Nvidia, Anthropic, Xai and others praised the plan. James Chernierwski, head of emerging technology policies at the Proview Celebrity Lobbying Group Consumer Choice Center, has announced Trump's AI plan as a “bold vision.”
“This is a world of difference from the Biden administration's hostile regulatory approach,” concluded Czerniawski.
