Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) is not happy with the Trump administration's silence on artificial intelligence risks, and he's pointing at a possible conflict of interest as the reason.
Schumer took to X on Tuesday to air his frustration over the lack of response to his call for a classified Senate briefing on AI risks, covering everything from cybersecurity to the flow of AI chips and manufacturing equipment to China.
“We’ve heard nothing but crickets over a week…” he wrote.
Then he offered a theory about why the administration might be so relaxed about the whole thing. The Trump family's sizable AI-related investments, he suggested, might be shaping the administration's stance.
“Maybe Trump’s not worried because his family has hundreds of millions (if not billions) tied up in the AI economy,” Schumer added.
Schumer Pushes Back On Trump's AI Stance
The post lands a week after Schumer and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) pushed back against Trump's dismissal of AI safety concerns. Schumer's argument: the U.S. can't afford to ignore the potential dangers of AI, no matter how intelligent the current president happens to be.
Earlier this month, Schumer called for an All-Senators classified briefing on AI risks, citing warnings from an Anthropic researcher about the dangers of pursuing artificial superintelligence. He urged the Trump administration to explain its frontier AI testing framework, its efforts to prevent AI chips and semiconductor equipment from reaching China, and its plans to protect the U.S. from AI-enabled cyberattacks.
On Tuesday, Trump said the Justice Department could intervene if AI companies create serious problems, while opposing new regulations he believes could hinder U.S. innovation. At the U.N., Trump also said federal documents would use the term “Super Intelligence” instead of “Artificial Intelligence.”
Trump's Trades Target AI And Tech
Here's where Schumer's conflict-of-interest argument gets its ammunition. Trump disclosed more than 20,000 stock trades over the past year, with investment disclosures released in May, July and August. The holdings were heavily concentrated in AI infrastructure, cloud computing and consumer technology companies.
Some of the companies that formed a part of his trades are Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT), Oracle Corp. (NYSE: ORCL), Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN), Nvidia Corp. (NASDAQ: NVDA) and Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (NASDAQ: AMD).
Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by MarketDash editors.
