Trump's AI brain trust: 5 factions, 0 coordination

the trump administration lacks a cohesive ai strategy, leaving policy to be determined by a scattered group of power brokers across agencies like commerce and the white house. key players include howard lutnick, who oversees export controls and advocates for us open-weights to counter china, and sean cairncross, a hardliner focused on preventing chinese model distillation who lacks technical experience. internal conflicts recently played out publicly as lutnick downplayed the capabilities of china's moonshot ai model while his agency struggled to enforce safeguards on anthropic. this lack of coordination means us ai companies face a volatile regulatory environment that could shift based on which advisor gains the president's ear.