Trump says top tech firms have signed accord to 'self-police' AI
development
[September 30, 2026] By
CHRISTOPHER RUGABER, WILL WEISSERT and MEG KINNARD
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he and a
large group of leaders of artificial intelligence companies had signed a
voluntary accord that will include internal and external reviews during
a meeting at the White House aimed at addressing Americans' fears about
the technology.
“I think I’m seeing tremendous self-policing. And they understand that
they have to self-police,” Trump told reporters during an impromptu
press conference outside the West Wing.
Trump and House Speaker Mike Johnson met with leading executives from
top tech firms that are spending hundreds of billions of dollars to
build out AI infrastructure, including data centers in communities
across the country, which have sparked grassroots, bipartisan
opposition.
The accord was signed by Trump, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Google CEO
Sundar Pichai, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, OpenAI President Greg Brockman,
Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, and Elon Musk, founder of xAI, which is now
part of SpaceX.
The accord, which Trump posted on his social media site, Truth Social,
late Tuesday, opened the door to future regulation but focused on four
voluntary steps for the companies to take.
The accord said the companies would implement “robust internal
controls,” partner with an “independent external auditor” to assess
whether the controls were working, and establish a committee within each
company's board of directors to evaluate reports from internal and
external auditors.
“Over time, it may make sense to codify these steps into laws and
regulations,” the accord said.
Trump repeatedly praised the business executives for developing a
technology that he said would produce “unbelievable growth." Investment
in data centers and the accompanying computer equipment has accelerated
the economy and boosted the stock market, which has swelled investment
accounts for higher-income Americans and lifted their spending.
Yet there were some notes of caution Tuesday. Amodei, who has been one
of the most outspoken voicescalling for a slowdown in AI development,
said, “The technology has very real risks.”
"And, you know, the mechanism, how we address those risks is still under
discussion,” Amodei said.
Putting faith in ‘self-policing’ AI
Trump suggested that about 10 people would be named to a committee to
“watch over the whole enterprise” and said the accord would be “morally
binding.” He also said he would name someone to oversee the agreement in
coming days after consulting with industry.
Some of the actions outlined in the accord are measures these companies
are already taking in some form or have previously committed to doing.
The intention of the accord balances the latitude needed for innovation
with regulation, said Shri Narayanan, a university professor of
electrical and computer engineering at the University of Southern
California. That innovation is not just limited to improving the
capabilities of these AI models, Narayanan said, but also to efforts to
improve model safety and security.
Other experts are skeptical of putting “so much faith in self-policing,”
like Robin Jia, an assistant professor of computer science at the
University of Southern California. Jia said it’s crucial to ensure the
leading labs’ intentions are “well-aligned with the broader interest of
the American public.” He pointed to the recent disclosures of hacking
incidents and said: “As the models get better, the consequences of such
things are only going to get greater.”
Some also took issue with the accord’s vague, broad language. Alex
Pascal, executive director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and
Society, said: “The only way to reduce the risks and harms of AI to
Americans is through robust legal liability, regulation and
fundamentally changing the race dynamics that are driving unsafe
decision-making by frontier AI developers whose costs are borne by the
American people.”
[to top of second column] |
President Donald Trump speaks in the East Room of the White House,
Tuesday Sept. 29, 2026, during a meeting and luncheon on artificial
intelligence (AI), in Washington. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
 Trump unveils chatbot to help
Americans navigate government services
Huang sat to Trump’s right during a White House luncheon meeting,
according to a seating chart the president posted on Truth Social.
Musk sat to Trump’s left.
Earlier Tuesday, Trump promised that the U.S. government wouldn't
limit the development of artificial intelligence or support calls
for “guardrails” or other restrictions.
“I will never stifle the growth of a technology that will be bigger
than the industrial revolution,” Trump said at the unveiling of an
AI chatbot, America.gov, intended to help Americans navigate
government services. “We can’t stifle it, and we’re leading by a
lot.”
The unveiling of the AI government chatbot occurred at a daylong
event in Washington during which multiple Trump administration
officials celebrated a “Golden Age” fueled by what Trump insists on
calling “super intelligence," rather than artificial intelligence.
Secretary of State Marco Rubio highlighted that the chatbot at
America.gov could soon be used to apply for a first-time passport
fully online, without the in-person visit to a processing center
currently required.
Trump thinks data centers are going to become ‘very popular’
Trump also said the executives had agreed to assuage the bipartisan
opposition to data centers cropping up in local communities across
the country by providing more financial support to local schools or
taking steps to reduce energy costs.
“You’re going to see, data centers are going to be very popular,"
Trump said. If the opposition continued, Trump suggested, “they’ll
be forced to go overseas or other locations.”
Also Tuesday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a television interview
that the company is increasingly focused on safety. The day before,
his company halted the rollout of a new model over safety concerns.
“We are pacing our progress, which includes sometimes not training a
model,” he said on CNBC. “We have to do these in a way where we can
make very confident safety cases and claims, so that people don’t
have a bunch of anxiety.”
For his part, Trump on Tuesday portrayed the race to develop AI as
largely a global competition between the United States and China. He
said there would be a winner and a loser, with no “second place.”
The two countries agreed last week to establish a channel for
handling AI-related incidents during Chinese President Xi Jinping's
visit to Washington. But Trump underscored Tuesday that he didn't
want to cooperate too much with China: "I didn’t want to do
anything, because we’re leading. Why would I want to do anything?”
___
Associated Press journalist Kaitlyn Huamani contributed from Los
Angeles.
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