President Donald Trump defended the artificial intelligence industry Sunday (September 13), dismissing growing safety concerns from tech leaders and saying the United States needs strong leadership rather than regulatory "guardrails" to manage AI development.

Trump made the comments during a golf tournament appearance at his resort in Doonbeg, Ireland, one day after Dario Amodei, CEO of artificial intelligence company Anthropic, called for greater precautions and a slower pace of AI advancement. "We can put guardrails, we can do this and that, but I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up that shouldn't be bringing it up, and they're bringing up things that won't happen," Trump told reporters. "But whoever wins with AI wins."

In a Truth Social post Monday (September 14), President Trump escalated his defense of the industry. "The only control or 'guardrails' that AI needs is a strong and smart (high IQ!) president, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!" he wrote. "There is a sick conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China."

Trump emphasized maintaining America's technological edge over China as his primary concern. Speaking with reporters during his flight back to Washington, the president said artificial intelligence is "going to be more good than bad, but by a lot." Chinese President Xi Jinping is scheduled to visit the White House later in September, and AI development is expected to be among the discussion topics.

The president's comments come as industry leaders increasingly call for safety measures. Both Elon Musk, who runs xAI, and Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, publicly endorsed Amodei's call for more safeguards through posts on X.

In his essay Saturday (September 12), Amodei compared AI to curing cancer and acknowledged both its promise and risks. "Carefully wielded, AI can be the latest in a long line of technological miracles that have uplifted and ennobled humanity," he wrote. On Tuesday (September 10), Anthropic released a threat intelligence report saying the company "disrupted operations in which threat actors tried to use Claude for malicious activity" during the prior eight months.

Jacob Coxon, a former Anthropic researcher who resigned over AI concerns, went public with fears that AI models could soon gain capabilities exceeding human control. "You're building a human-level or superhuman-level mind, without understanding what it wants, or thinks, or the way it thinks," Coxon said. On Monday (September 8), Coxon claimed that "people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade."

The debate has become a major election-year issue as companies build computing warehouses across small towns nationwide. A recent NBC News Decision Desk poll found that 69% of respondents oppose construction of AI data centers in their area, with concerns about farmland, water supplies, and rising electricity bills. Trump has maintained his support for data centers, saying in August that communities should accept them unless they want to be "backwards and poor."

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries criticized Republican leaders for allowing members to leave Washington during September. "We should take decisive action now so that we can slow down, as the CEOs have recently acknowledged, the pace of development in order to protect the American people and ensure that AI is proceeding safely," Jeffries said. Former President Barack Obama told Jeffries at an event last week that Democrats should make AI a campaign issue.

House Speaker Mike Johnson acknowledged the need for "some guardrails, some safety measures" while echoing Trump's concerns about China. Johnson said he has discussed the issue with President Trump and believes summoning industry leaders for "one big meeting" should be the "next step." "But we don't need everybody to panic right now," Johnson added.

Kevin Hassett, director of the National Economic Council at the White House, said meetings involving administration officials who oversee cyber and science and technology policy are expected this week to discuss next steps. Lawmakers agree that more guardrails are needed, but narrow attempts at imposing rules have fallen apart over the years.

David Sacks, co-chairman of a White House advisory council on science and technology, responded to AI leaders' calls for regulation with a social media post challenging them. "The easiest way not to build superintelligence is for you to agree not to build it," Sacks wrote.

Armstrong & Getty