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Trump calls AI fears a hoax
September 16, 2026
Trump dismisses warnings about artificial intelligence as a hoax in social media posts on Monday, and speaks by phone with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang during a summit in Los Angeles.
Donald Trump, in his second term as president, has pushed federal policy toward rapid artificial intelligence development, and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang sits on his council of science and technology advisers.
Key facts
- NBC News issued a correction on Sept. 14, 2026, at 10:39 p.m. ET. An earlier version of the piece, headline included, gave the wrong event for the phone conversation between Trump and Nvidia's chief.
- Speaking Tuesday at a conference billed as “pro-human” and devoted to AI's dangers, Steve Bannon, who once advised Trump, said: "We think this could be a great technology, but we're not going to give these guys a carte blanche."
- During the call with Trump, Huang said: “We're going to make sure that everybody wins in the AI race in America. Every industry, every company, every state, every people.”
- Seats near the front at Trump's inauguration went to Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos of Amazon, Sam Altman of OpenAI and Tim Cook, formerly head of Apple.
- In a weekend essay, Anthropic chief Dario Amodei argued that building AI requires safeguards. Tesla's Elon Musk and OpenAI's Sam Altman were among those who backed the piece soon afterward.
Trump is pressing his case that alarm over artificial intelligence is a hoax, and the four accounts corroborate the substance of it. CNN reports his Truth Social posts on Monday, in which he casts himself as the buster of a hoax about AI taking over and destroying the world, and draws the analogy to his long-running dismissal of climate change. NBC News reports the same flurry of posts, with Trump branding AI concerns a conspiracy, and adds that he lauded politically unpopular data centers as great and as a way for people and states to grow wealthy. Fox News reports Trump saying critics are playing into the hands of people who do not want AI to happen. The New York Times ties his Truth Social defense of AI data centers to the pushback he drew from commenters.
The phone call is the most widely carried element. NBC News reports that Trump called Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and was put on speakerphone, and that Huang told him everybody wins in the AI race in America, every industry, every company, every state. Fox News reports the setting: Huang answered on stage at the All-In Summit in Los Angeles before an audience of thousands, with video of the call shared by the All-In Podcast. NBC News carries a correction saying a previous version of its article and its headline misstated the event where Trump spoke to Huang by phone, and reports that Huang, who helped persuade Trump last year against sending National Guard troops to San Francisco, sits on the president's council of science and technology advisers.
On the resistance, the accounts agree and divide the labor rather than the facts. BBC reports former Trump adviser Steve Bannon telling a pro-human conference on the dangers of AI that the technology could be great without a carte blanche for the companies building it, and reports that the ranks of doubters have grown in recent weeks, including inside Trump's own Republican Party. NBC News reports Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's weekend essay arguing AI development needs safeguards, endorsed by Elon Musk and Sam Altman. CNN reports Obama's statement on Tuesday setting breakthroughs in medicine, energy and education against economic disruption, inequality and potential catastrophe. Fox News reports Senate Majority Leader John Thune declining to endorse the hoax characterization and Senator Sanders' AI Data Center Moratorium Act, which would halt construction and expansion of major AI data centers until Congress establishes national safeguards. What Trump said, and where and how he said it, is settled across BBC, CNN, NBC News and Fox News. What Washington does about it is not.
The president rang Nvidia chief Jensen Huang, whose firm builds AI chips and hardware, and found himself broadcast over a speakerphone at an industry gathering. “Data centers are great, and they make people wealthy,” the president told him.
the president
Still developing
The timing of a meeting between Trump and AI leaders has not been set, and Congress has yet to pass any AI legislation.
How settled the reporting is
Sources
- BBC — Why Trump is all-in on AI despite the warnings
- CNN — One word that explains Trump’s AI denialism
- NBC News — Trump calls Nvidia CEO to talk AI — and gets put on speakerphone during industry summit
- Fox News — Bipartisan, big tech push for AI regulation comes as Trump claims 'hoax'
Toggle read the full reports of 4 of the 5 outlets counted on this event. The other 1 are counted from their headlines and opening sentences.