US govt sides with OpenAI in New York Times copyright lawsuit

The United States government has taken the side of OpenAI in a copyright lawsuit filed by The New York Times, according to a court document filed on Tuesday. The Trump administration defended the training of AI models on copyrighted works, stating that it is exceedingly transformative and allows the benefits of such training to outweigh any competitive harm.

The justice department argued that constraining large language model (LLM) development under a misunderstanding of fair use doctrine would hinder creative progress, scientific advancement, and American prosperity. Associate Attorney General Stanley Woodward emphasized that AI dominance is critical to national security, prosperity, and economic mobility, and that the administration would never let the nation fall behind foreign adversaries due to a flawed understanding of copyright law.