US cannot lose AI race to China: Blanche
Washington: The United States cannot afford to lose the artificial intelligence race to China, Attorney General Todd Blanche has said, while promising action against Chinese individuals and companies that steal from American technology businesses.
Speaking during a media availability at the White House, Blanche described AI as highly beneficial and rejected calls for the Justice Department to regulate or slow the technology.
“We can’t lose the AI race to China, right?” Blanche said. “President Trump says that, everybody says that, but they say it because it’s true.”
His remarks came after questions about warnings from technology leaders that rapidly advancing AI systems could pose national security and other serious risks.
Blanche said the Justice Department would investigate criminal conduct connected to AI but would not assume the role of a technology regulator.
“There’s plenty of cases involving AI that we’ve charged individuals,” he said. “I do not think it’s the job of the Department of Justice to regulate.”
“We’re prosecutors, not regulators, so we’re not going to try to regulate AI,” Blanche added.
The attorney general said AI offered significant benefits to American society. He also backed President Donald Trump’s contention that the recent political debate over possible AI dangers was being driven partly by the approaching midterm elections.
“AI is extraordinarily beneficial to our society,” Blanche said. “There’s a lot of great work that AI does.”
He questioned why Democratic senators were raising the issue two months before the election after what he described as a prolonged period of silence.
“So to talk about the timing of this as being nothing but an effort to influence the midterms, I shouldn’t have to say that out loud,” Blanche said. “Of course, that’s what it is, and that shouldn’t be what drives the decisions that we’re making around AI.”
Asked whether the US government should take action against China for the alleged theft of information from American AI companies, Blanche drew a distinction between China as a country and individual actors operating there.
“When you say China, you’re talking about an entire country,” he said.
Blanche said Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping had a strong working relationship despite disputes involving companies and individuals in China.
“Those two presidents have a great relationship and they get along, they make deals together,” Blanche said.
He said misconduct by actors and companies in China predated the Trump administration and was likely to remain a law-enforcement concern.
“The Department of Justice and other agencies in the executive, of course, we’re doing everything we can to combat that and to go after that in the right way,” Blanche said.
“But I don’t think it’s fair to just label China as a country. There’s bad actors in China that are doing it, which we’re definitely going to go after.”
Blanche declined to say whether OpenAI, Google and Anthropic would need antitrust waivers to work together on security measures for their AI models. He said any such decision would involve multiple factors and an established Justice Department process.
He encouraged technology companies to address problems involving their systems and to work with the government when necessary.
The United States and China are competing for leadership in advanced semiconductors, computing infrastructure and AI models. Washington has imposed restrictions intended to limit China’s access to some cutting-edge chips and manufacturing equipment.
India is also expanding its AI infrastructure, semiconductor ambitions and digital economy. The outcome of the US-China technology competition could influence global supply chains, investment flows and the standards governing AI systems used in India and other major markets.