By Alyssa Lukpat and Natalie Andrews
President Trump signed an executive order Thursday that aims to override state laws on artificial intelligence.
The order would allow the Justice Department to punish states with rules deemed restrictive for AI, in a move to bring the U.S. under one federal standard. Silicon Valley executives had been lobbying the president to ban state AI laws that they said could cause the U.S. to lose the AI race to China.
"We have to be unified," Trump said in the Oval Office, citing that China didn't have to contend with state legislatures. "China has one vote because they have one vote, and that's President Xi, he says do it and that's the end of that."
The White House planned to examine certain state laws through a legal task force convened by the Justice Department that could withhold federal funding. The approach could put the administration in conflict with Republican states which have sought to pass laws protecting children or regulating data centers in their state.
There have been over 1,000 AI bills proposed at the state level.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, pitched an additional executive order that would safeguard children. "States must help protect children and families while America accelerates its leadership in AI," he said in a post on X on Thursday ahead of Trump's order.
Congressional Republicans sought to pass a moratorium on state laws in both the tax bill that passed in July and in this year's defense bill. Both of those efforts failed.
Trump is testing the loyalty of MAGA conservatives including his former strategist Steve Bannon and Sen. Josh Hawley (R., Mo.). They opposed banning state AI laws in Congress, saying the move would be a giveaway to tech companies and would undermine states' ability to install guardrails for consumer protections and regulate potential harms from AI.
White House AI czar David Sacks said Thursday that the government planned to keep laws protecting children's safety but target certain state regulations deemed onerous.
Trump said people or companies working on artificial intelligence shouldn't have road blocks to set up a business in the U.S.
"If they had to get 50 different approvals from 50 different states you can forget it because it's not possible to do," he said.
Write to Alyssa Lukpat at alyssa.lukpat@wsj.com and Natalie Andrews at natalie.andrews@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
December 11, 2025 19:12 ET (00:12 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2025 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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