U.S. tech policy under President-elect Donald Trump will look different in many ways from the exiting administration of President Joe Biden. Trump will prioritize protecting speech on social media platforms over targeting misinformation, and innovation in AI over safety.
Trump's promises to repeal Biden's executive order on artificial intelligence, which aimed to create safe and trustworthy AI systems and required federal agencies to develop AI safety standards, indicate that he likely intends to shift away from a safety-first focus on AI. Additionally, he's voiced issues with big tech's content moderation practices for social media platforms.
Trump recently appointed Andrew Ferguson to chair the Federal Trade Commission. In a post on Truth Social, Trump said Ferguson "has a proven record of standing up to Big Tech censorship, and protecting Freedom of Speech in our Great Country."
His focus on protecting free speech isn't entirely off base, said David Moschella, a nonresident senior fellow at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation. Moschella spoke during a Dec. 17 webinar about U.S. tech policy under Trump.
"When we look at how technology is supposedly undermining trust, the claims are fundamentally exaggerated, and the problems are much deeper than that," Moschella said. "Tech is being used primarily as a scapegoat."
Misinformation under Trump
Moschella pointed to examples of social media companies taking down speech identified as misinformation even when it wasn't necessarily false. He cited examples such as companies removing posts suggesting that the origin of COVID-19 was from a lab leak in Wuhan, China.
The Republican-led Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic released a statement in May 2024 after a review of U.S. Department of State documents that the subcommittee said "credibly suggest COVID-19 originated from a lab related accident in Wuhan, China. The documents also strongly convey that the Chinese Communist Party attempted to cover-up the lab leak."
"We were told that the idea COVID came from the Wuhan lab was a conspiracy theory," Moschella said.
Republicans, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Trump's pick for U.S. Secretary of State, have raised concerns about big tech's power to label and take down content it considers misinformation, an issue that's become widely debated. Big tech companies -- including Meta, owner of Facebook and Instagram, and X, formerly Twitter -- have already walked back content moderation policies and cut content moderation teams.
Prioritizing U.S. AI innovation
Gartner analyst George Sellner said Trump will also likely shift gears on how the federal government approaches AI. He spoke during a Gartner webinar on potential changes to U.S. tech policy under the Trump administration.
Sellner said while it's impossible to predict the exact future policy landscape, Trump took several actions on AI during his previous administration, which can provide some insights into how he might approach AI in his new term.
During his first administration, Trump signed the National AI Initiative Act, which created research and development programs that continued under the Biden administration. Trump's previous approach centered on leadership and innovation, Sellner said.
Economic competitiveness was another cornerstone of Trump's policy. By easing regulatory barriers, the administration aimed to enhance the adoption of AI across various industries.
George SellnerAnalyst, Gartner
"Economic competitiveness was another cornerstone of Trump's policy," Sellner said. "By easing regulatory barriers, the administration aimed to enhance the adoption of AI across various industries."
In contrast, Biden placed a strong emphasis on AI safety and security. Biden's executive order on AI reflected broader concerns about not just AI risk and safety, but ethical issues surrounding AI, including equity and civil rights. During his administration, Biden helped establish frameworks to manage AI risk. He took a centralized approach to managing AI risk by appointing chief AI officers within federal agencies to coordinate the federal AI approach.
Trump's previous administration favored a decentralized approach, allowing greater flexibility and innovation in AI across federal agencies, Sellner said. If Trump rescinds Biden's order, it could lead to the elimination of the role of chief AI officers. That would lead to a redistribution of AI responsibilities throughout federal agencies. He added that the AI Safety Institute also faces an uncertain future under Trump.
The different approaches are in part circumstantial, Sellner said. While the previous Trump administration was responding to a need for sustaining AI research and development to compete on a global scale, the Biden administration was responding to significant advances in generative AI capabilities and the potential risks that the emerging technology created.
Regardless of the different approaches, Trump and Biden recognized AI's transformative potential, "but their policies reflect different priorities and strategies for harnessing AI's benefits while mitigating its risks," Sellner said.
Gartner analyst Moutusi Sau said the Trump administration will likely take an innovation-first approach to AI, which would mean less federal oversight of AI system development and deployment. With less federal involvement, businesses will need to play a bigger AI governance role to ensure the safety and security of their AI systems, she said. Sau also spoke during the Gartner webinar.
"There might be uncertainty in what's going to happen in the future, but the basics are always there," she said. "Look at how you're preventing bias, data privacy, what your data sharing policy is going to look like and keeping human oversight at all times. Those are the basic things you need."
Makenzie Holland is a senior news writer covering big tech and federal regulation. Prior to joining TechTarget Editorial, she was a general assignment reporter for the Wilmington StarNews and a crime and education reporter at the Wabash Plain Dealer.
