Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence
Executive Order 14179 signed by President Donald Trump on January 23, 2025
EO 14179
President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14179, titled "Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence," on January 23, 2025, aiming to reinforce U.S. dominance in AI by promoting innovation and reducing regulatory barriers. The order emphasizes developing AI systems "free from ideological bias or engineered social agendas" to ensure economic competitiveness, national security, and human flourishing. It revokes President Joe Biden’s 2023 Executive Order 14110, which focused on safe, secure, and trustworthy AI development with safeguards against risks like bias and discrimination. Trump’s order mandates a review of all policies and regulations stemming from Biden’s framework to identify and eliminate barriers to innovation, and it calls for an AI Action Plan within 180 days to sustain U.S. leadership.
Recap of Executive Order 14179
Objective: Strengthen U.S. leadership in AI by prioritizing innovation, free markets, and deregulation while ensuring AI systems are ideologically neutral.
Key Actions:
Revokes Biden’s EO 14110, criticized as burdensome and restrictive to private sector innovation.
Directs agencies to revise or rescind policies conflicting with the goal of enhancing AI leadership.
Establishes a task force, led by the Assistant to the President for Science and Technology, the Special Advisor for AI and Crypto, and the National Security Advisor, to develop an AI Action Plan within 180 days.
Instructs the Office of Management and Budget to revise AI governance memoranda to align with deregulation goals.
Ideological Neutrality: Emphasizes AI development free from "ideological bias" or "engineered social agendas," contrasting with Biden’s focus on equity and civil rights protections.
Philosophical Shift: Moves away from oversight and risk mitigation toward a deregulatory approach, relying on existing laws (e.g., Civil Rights Act) to address issues like discrimination rather than imposing new AI-specific regulations.
Findings on AI Language Models Distributed and Used Worldwide
The executive order itself does not provide specific findings on the state of AI language models globally, but the broader context and available information offer insights into the current landscape of AI language models:
Global Distribution and Use:
Major Models: Leading AI language models include those developed by U.S. companies (e.g., OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, Anthropic’s Claude), Chinese developers (e.g., DeepSeek’s R-1, Alibaba’s Qwen), and open-source communities (e.g., Meta’s LLaMA, Mistral’s Mixtral). These models are deployed across industries like healthcare, finance, education, and customer service worldwide.
U.S. Dominance: The U.S. remains a leader due to its robust innovation ecosystem, with companies like OpenAI and Google setting benchmarks for large language models (LLMs). However, China is rapidly advancing, with models like DeepSeek’s R-1 challenging Western counterparts in performance and cost-efficiency.
Open-Source Growth: Open-source models, such as LLaMA and Mistral, are widely adopted globally, enabling smaller organizations and developers to customize AI solutions. This democratization has spurred innovation but raised concerns about misuse (e.g., misinformation, deepfakes).
Ideological Bias Concerns:
Perceived Bias: Critics, including Trump and Elon Musk, argue that some AI models reflect "liberal bias" due to training data or developer priorities, particularly in anti-bias provisions or content moderation. For example, models like ChatGPT have been accused of favoring certain political or social viewpoints in responses.
Mitigation Efforts: Biden’s EO 14110 emphasized reducing bias and ensuring equity in AI applications (e.g., hiring, healthcare). Trump’s order, however, views such measures as "engineered social agendas" that stifle innovation, prioritizing neutrality without defining specific standards.
Global Perspectives: In Europe, the EU AI Act imposes strict regulations on high-risk AI systems to address bias and safety, contrasting with Trump’s deregulatory stance. China, meanwhile, tightly controls AI to align with state ideology, limiting free expression in models like Qwen.
Challenges and Risks:
Bias Persistence: Studies show that LLMs can perpetuate biases present in training data, such as gender or racial stereotypes, despite efforts to mitigate them. For instance, models trained on internet data may reflect societal biases unless carefully curated.
Misinformation: Globally distributed models can amplify misinformation if not properly governed, a concern heightened by Trump’s focus on deregulation.
Safety and Oversight: Biden’s framework required safety testing and red-teaming for high-risk models, which Trump’s order deprioritizes. This could accelerate innovation but increase risks in critical sectors like infrastructure or defense.
Competitive Landscape:
U.S. vs. China: China’s investments in AI infrastructure and state-backed models challenge U.S. dominance. Projects like the $500 billion Stargate initiative, mentioned in Trump’s broader AI strategy, aim to counter this by boosting U.S. private sector capacity.
Global Regulation: The EU’s stringent AI Act and fragmented U.S. state laws create a complex regulatory environment. Trump’s order seeks to streamline U.S. policy, but the lack of comprehensive federal AI legislation may lead to inconsistencies.
Summary
Trump’s Executive Order 14179 shifts U.S. AI policy toward deregulation and innovation, emphasizing ideologically neutral AI systems to maintain global leadership. It reverses Biden’s focus on safety, equity, and oversight, viewing such measures as barriers to progress. While the order does not directly analyze global AI language models, it responds to concerns about ideological bias in models like ChatGPT and aims to counter rising competition from China and open-source ecosystems. Globally, AI models are widely used but face challenges like bias, misinformation, and varying regulatory approaches. The order’s deregulatory stance may accelerate U.S. innovation but risks reducing safeguards, potentially impacting trust and safety in AI deployment worldwide. The forthcoming AI Action Plan, due by July 2025, will clarify the administration’s strategy further.
Executive Order 14179—Removing Barriers to American Leadership in Artificial Intelligence
January 23, 2025
By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, it is hereby ordered:
Section 1. Purpose. The United States has long been at the forefront of artificial intelligence (AI) innovation, driven by the strength of our free markets, world-class research institutions, and entrepreneurial spirit. To maintain this leadership, we must develop AI systems that are free from ideological bias or engineered social agendas. With the right Government policies, we can solidify our position as the global leader in AI and secure a brighter future for all Americans.
This order revokes certain existing AI policies and directives that act as barriers to American AI innovation, clearing a path for the United States to act decisively to retain global leadership in artificial intelligence.
Sec. 2. Policy. It is the policy of the United States to sustain and enhance America's global AI dominance in order to promote human flourishing, economic competitiveness, and national security.
Sec. 3. Definition. For the purposes of this order, "artificial intelligence" or "AI" has the meaning set forth in 15 U.S.C. 9401(3).
Sec. 4. Developing an Artificial Intelligence Action Plan. (a) Within 180 days of this order, the Assistant to the President for Science and Technology (APST), the Special Advisor for AI and Crypto, and the Assistant to the President for National Security Affairs (APNSA), in coordination with the Assistant to the President for Economic Policy, the Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB Director), and the heads of such executive departments and agencies (agencies) as the APST and APNSA deem relevant, shall develop and submit to the President an action plan to achieve the policy set forth in section 2 of this order.
Sec. 5. Implementation of Order Revocation. (a) The APST, the Special Advisor for AI and Crypto, and the APNSA shall immediately review, in coordination with the heads of all agencies as they deem relevant, all policies, directives, regulations, orders, and other actions taken pursuant to the revoked Executive Order 14110 of October 30, 2023 (Safe, Secure, and Trustworthy Development and Use of Artificial Intelligence). The APST, the Special Advisor for AI and Crypto, and the APNSA shall, in coordination with the heads of relevant agencies, identify any actions taken pursuant to Executive Order 14110 that are or may be inconsistent with, or present obstacles to, the policy set forth in section 2 of this order. For any such agency actions identified, the heads of agencies shall, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, suspend, revise, or rescind such actions, or propose suspending, revising, or rescinding such actions. If in any case such suspension, revision, or rescission cannot be finalized immediately, the APST and the heads of agencies shall promptly take steps to provide all available exemptions authorized by any such orders, rules, regulations, guidelines, or policies, as appropriate and consistent with applicable law, until such action can be finalized.
(b) Within 60 days of this order, the OMB Director, in coordination with the APST, shall revise OMB Memoranda M-24-10 and M-24-18 as necessary to make them consistent with the policy set forth in section 2 of this order.
Sec. 6. General Provisions. (a) Nothing in this order shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect:
(i) the authority granted by law to an executive department or agency, or the head thereof; or
(ii) the functions of the Director of the Office of Management and Budget relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(b) This order shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of appropriations.
(c) This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.
DONALD J. TRUMP
The White House,
January 23, 2025.