Trump and Xi Won’t Find Common Ground on AI Safety
The leaders have fundamentally different ideas about the technology and how to regulate it.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping are set to meet in Washington on September 24th, with AI safety likely to be a key topic of discussion. However, analysts are skeptical about the prospects for productive alignment on this issue. The two nations have fundamentally different perspectives on AI risk. U.S. tech industry leaders are focused on speculative scenarios involving superintelligence, while Chinese officials are more concerned with technical failures and the socioeconomic consequences of AI.
This divergent viewpoint could make it challenging to find common ground on AI safety measures during the summit. China's regulatory capacity also appears to be a significant obstacle. The Chinese tech sector is tightly controlled, with heavy fines, canceled IPOs, ideological restrictions, and political loyalty checks. In contrast, the U.S. tech sector has more avenues for resisting regulation, including lobbying, legal challenges, and even alleged financial backing of political figures.
While there may be some shared problems to address, such as the recent OpenAI-Hugging Face security breach, the mismatched regulatory capacities and regulatory approaches of the two countries make it unlikely that they could establish shared standards. Furthermore, the White House has expressed strong opposition to AI regulation, with President Trump dismissing concerns about Chinese opposition to AI and data centers as a "sick conspiracy."
Trump's recent shift towards anti-China rhetoric, which has surprised many Republican politicians, could complicate cooperation efforts. This shift was evident this weekend when the head of China's state security ministry accused U.S. AI models of being part of a "propaganda war and cognitive war" against China. Despite these political tensions, Xi Jinping did make a brief visit to India over the weekend, signaling a degree of reconciliation between the two countries.
However, it remains uncertain whether China and the United States can set aside their differences and collaborate on AI safety during the upcoming summit.
Written by urgent.news from Foreign Policy's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
