President Trump says he will sign order limiting states' ability to regulate AI

President Donald Trump is just waiting on Congress to block state AI regulations.

President Trump said Monday he would sign an executive order aimed at ensuring there is only “one rulebook” for AI in the United States, saying AI technology would be “destroyed in its infancy” if companies had to follow different regulations in all 50 states.

“At this point in the campaign, we're ahead of everyone, but when 50 states (many of them bad actors) are involved in the rules and approval process, that won't last long,” Trump wrote. “You can't expect companies to get 50 approvals every time they do something. That's never going to work.”

It's not yet clear what form the executive order will take, but a draft executive order seen by Business Insider last month would direct the Justice Department to sue states with “onerous” AI laws.

one thing teeth Clear: Many Republicans are keen to protect states' rights when it comes to AI, so if Mr. Trump does this, it will likely provoke a backlash from members of his own party.

The fault lines on this issue became clear over the summer when Republicans tried to enact a 10-year moratorium on state-level AI regulation through the Big Beautiful Act.

The provision was eventually watered down over time, and was removed from the bill by a 99-1 vote in the Senate in the final hours before passage.

President Trump recently called on Republicans to include the provision in the annual defense bill they must pass, but that did not happen. On Sunday, lawmakers released the text of the bill, which did not include this provision.

Meanwhile, the Trump administration has been exploring other ways to block states from enacting AI laws. The White House's AI Action Plan released in July calls for withholding federal funding from states that implement “burdensome” AI laws.