Trump claims fears around AI are 'hoax' pushed by China, politicians, in call with Nvidia CEO

"The data centers are great, and they make people wealthy, and they make states wealthy. And it's the oil of the next 20 to 25 years; it's even bigger than the internet," Trump claimed on Monday.

US President Donald Trump called the recent developments in the artificial intelligence sector, which involve several industry leaders warning about the dangers of AI, a "hoax" during a Monday call with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang.

Trump, who has been pushing against the call from the sector to slow down AI development amid fears that the technology is out of control, called Huang while he was speaking live on the All-In Podcast and told him that "AI doomerism" is "all a hoax… and we're not going to let that happen.”

"The data centers are great, and they make people wealthy, and they make states wealthy. And it's the oil of the next 20 to 25 years; it's even bigger than the internet," Trump claimed in his call with the Nvidia CEO. "They [the AI industry leaders] are playing right into the hands of some people that don't want to see it happening."

The US President also claimed that "China and maybe some politicians" were behind the recent push to slow down development, adding that they "are no gonna let that happen." Huang agreed: "You are right, we are not going to let that happen, sir."

'We have to be careful,' Trump admits

After claiming that the recent news was "nothing but a hoax" and that "the robots would not be taking over the world," Trump clarified that "we have to be a little bit careful."

"We have to do things prudently, but it doesn't mean that we will stop an industry," he added, and then extended support to Huang, saying that "he was with him all the way."

"I have an expression: 'Whoever wins AI will win.' And we can't let this kind of stuff happen, and that includes very much data centers," Trump concluded.

Earlier on Monday, Trump issued a series of Truth Social posts insisting that the situation with AI was "a hoax" that was being pushed by foreign actors and "the Democrats."

"The people that say AI is going to destroy the world, and that data centers are bad for your neighborhood, are the same people that said, just a short time ago, that the world would be extinguished by 'Climate Change.' That hoax never worked out for them, and now they’re on to the next one," Trump said in one of his posts.

"These people are revolutionaries, but revolutionaries for a bad and evil cause. Soon you’ll find out they’re working for people that do not have the best interests of the United States in mind," he added.

What are AI industry leaders saying?

The fears of AI "running out of control" were initially pushed on Wednesday by Jacob Coxon, a former employee of both Anthropic and OpenAI who said that both companies were acting irresponsibly and “gambling with our lives," while warning that the technology could "kill us all by the end of the decade."

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei replied to these accusations on Saturday with an essay asking AI companies to "slow down development" to "manage the risk of AI."

"We must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models. Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain," Amodei said in an essay. "A race to the bottom, spurred by commercial incentives, can make these risks more acute."

While Amodei expressed the potential benefits of the technology, including his belief that "AI could cure most major diseases in the next 5–10 years, greatly accelerate economic growth rates, create a world of abundance and empowerment, and usher in a renaissance of democracy and freedom," he also acknowledged struggling with the risk-to-benefit balance from the beginning of Anthropic.

In a similar tone, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced that the Initial Public Offering (IPO) that the company had planned for this year was going to be pushed back at least until 2027, citing safety concerns over artificial intelligence that render "unacceptable" even a 10% risk that AI could cause human extinction by decade's end.

"I actually think that, given everything happening with safety, right now would be an ill-advised moment to go public, and we don't feel pressure on that," Altman told business magazine Fortune.

Asked if there was a 10% chance of AI-driven extinction, Altman said he didn't know how to make such an estimate, but warned the risk was serious enough that AI companies and governments should act as though it could not be tolerated.

"Whether it's 10 or eight or six, the point is, we all have a tremendous amount of responsibility, and cannot let egos or incentives for profit or anything else get in the way," Altman added.