US President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he had postponed the signing of a planned executive order on regulating artificial intelligence (AI), out of concern that it might undermine America’s leading position over China in the field.
“We’re leading China, we’re leading everybody, and I don’t want to do anything that’s going to get in the way of that lead,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
The signing ceremony, which was originally scheduled for Thursday afternoon, was delayed “because I didn’t like certain aspects” of the new regulations, Trump said.
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According to earlier reports, the executive order would have required developers of AI models to submit their models to several federal agencies for voluntary review up to 90 days before their public release.
“We have a very substantial standard on AI, it’s causing – it’s causing tremendous good, and it’s also bringing in a lot of jobs, tremendous numbers of jobs,” Trump said, adding, “again, we have more people working right now than we’ve ever had. I really thought that could have been a blocker.”
US media, citing sources, reported that the decision to initiate formal regulatory procedures stemmed from concerns that AI was becoming increasingly powerful and could pose a security risk to the US.
Trump scraps signing AI executive order to keep ‘lead’ over China in industry
