A profound fracture has opened in the United States regarding artificial intelligence safety, splitting major tech leaders and political figures into two opposing camps. On one side stands President Donald Trump, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, and former White House crypto czar David Sacks, who are firmly opposed to new regulatory measures. The opposing coalition includes a notable alliance of rival AI labs: Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, and Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, supported by a broad group of AI researchers calling for a slowdown in development.
The controversy gained momentum last week after Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon resigned, alleging that companies like OpenAI and Anthropic are “gambling with our lives.” The situation escalated when an Anthropic alignment lead stated there is a greater than 10% probability that AI could result in human extinction. In response to these warnings, Amodei proposed a pause on advancing AI capabilities, a stance quickly endorsed by Altman and Musk, who took to social media to affirm that “Dario is right” and claimed he had been raising alarms for a long time.
In Washington, the call for a regulatory pause has drawn support from unexpected political allies. Senators Bernie Sanders and Rep. Chip Roy, along with former White House strategist Steve Bannon, gathered at a nonprofit event in the nation’s capital to advocate for government action on AI risks.
Conversely, President Trump has aggressively rejected these concerns. Through multiple posts on Truth Social, he labeled fears of runaway AI as a “hoax” and a “scam,” while also criticizing backlash against public data centers. Trump has directed House Speaker Mike Johnson to convene AI leaders at the White House within the coming week, signaling the administration’s intent to push back against the slowing proposals championed by industry rivals.
Jensen Huang represents hardware makers. Does he truly understand the alignment problem?
Interesting that Musk and Altman are suddenly aligned on this. Suspicious timing there.
Calling it a hoax seems risky when leading researchers are resigned over safety concerns.
The extinction probability claim is terrifying. We need serious regulation before it is too late.