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Over the weekend, several current and former advisors to President Donald Trump on AI publicly traded insults aimed at the nation’s leading AI companies. David Sacks, the president’s AI and crypto “czar” until March, branded Anthropic’s models as “lobotomized” and “woke.” Emil Michael, a former Pentagon official, called OpenAI’s new head of strategic futures a “complete village fool.”
It started because no one can agree on what to do about China’s rapid AI progress.
The release of DeepSeek’s latest model earlier this year sent shockwaves through Silicon Valley, showing that Chinese AI companies could compete with — and in some areas surpass — their American counterparts. That achievement has fractured the U.S. AI policy landscape, splitting it into two camps: those who want to double down on restrictions and those who argue that engaging with China is the only way to stay competitive.
The internal strife within Trump’s AI circle reflects a broader uncertainty. For years, the U.S. believed it held an unassailable lead in artificial intelligence. China’s breakthroughs have shattered that assumption, and the American AI establishment is still figuring out how to respond. The public infighting among the president’s own advisors is perhaps the clearest sign yet that there’s no consensus — and no clear path forward.
