President Trump escalated his dismissal of growing warnings about artificial intelligence risk this weekend, declaring that the only safeguard the technology actually needs is himself. In a post described as “STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT,” Trump suggested that his own leadership, not regulation, oversight boards, or industry coordination, is sufficient to manage whatever risks AI poses. He went further, alleging that opposition to AI development and the data centers powering it amounts to a coordinated conspiracy, describing critics as “Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers.”

The comments landed as Trump’s hands off approach to AI faces its most serious political test yet. Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the Irish Open golf tournament in Doonbeg, Ireland, Trump rejected calls from the AI industry’s own leaders to slow the pace of development, saying, “We’re leading China in AI, we’re the most sophisticated country in the world, and frankly I want to keep it that way. Whoever wins AI wins.” He attributed the growing safety warnings to unspecified “negative forces,” telling reporters, “I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up that shouldn’t be bringing it up. And they’re bringing up things that won’t happen.” Hours later, aboard the flight back to Washington, Trump insisted he was not downplaying the risks, saying, “I’m not downplaying. But it’s going to be more good than bad, by a lot.” He also confirmed he personally uses AI but declined to say how.

Trump’s posture puts him at odds with a rare united front among AI’s most powerful executives. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, and xAI founder Elon Musk have all endorsed slowing the pace at which AI capabilities improve, a shift that followed the resignation of an Anthropic researcher who warned publicly that the industry was not developing AI responsibly. Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also signaled openness to ideas like deliberate pacing and independent evaluators, though he stressed any safety framework would need to preserve enterprise customers’ control over their own data.

Democrats are moving quickly to turn the moment into a midterm attack line. Michigan Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed endorsed Senator Bernie Sanders’ proposal to pause AI development altogether, saying on “Face the Nation,” “There are things that we should not be using AI to do, and we collectively have to decide that we need public oversight so that all of this technology is not being created for the interest of a few against the well-being of the many.” Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, who last month signed an executive order restricting data center development in his state after previously encouraging it, called the industry’s warnings a “bright flashing red light” and wrote that it is “long past time for our federal government to step up, take this seriously, and put up some guardrails, both here at home and on the global stage.” Former President Obama has privately urged Democratic leaders to make AI oversight central to the party’s platform, viewing the executives’ calls for a slowdown as a “positive development.”

Even some Republicans are breaking from the White House. Michigan Senate candidate Mike Rogers, a former House Intelligence Committee chairman now running against El-Sayed, wrote that he supports slowing AI development and would prioritize a national security framework for the technology, saying, “My experience as Intel Chairman taught me the time to stop a crisis is yesterday.” House Speaker Mike Johnson took a softer line, telling CNN there is “an obvious corporate responsibility that the people who are creating these models have to have to ensure that their products are safe,” while pointing to White House AI adviser David Sacks, who has argued companies should simply act on their own rather than seeking government cover. Sacks wrote bluntly, “Stop pretending you need anyone else’s permission,” and argued that the companies’ interest in slowing down is not “purely altruistic” given their exposure to product liability if their systems enable a serious cyberattack.

That liability question sits at the center of a separate fight over Amodei’s request that the government waive antitrust laws so AI companies can coordinate on safety. Legal experts have pushed back on the idea that such a waiver is even necessary, noting that courts have for a century allowed companies to cooperate on matters of public safety without violating the Sherman Antitrust Act, so long as safety is not used as a pretext to suppress competition. Former Justice Department antitrust official Slade Bond argued the request reveals how allergic the industry has become to any legal exposure at all, saying, “They want a blank check. They don’t like product liability, they don’t like copyright, and now they don’t like antitrust.”

The debate is unfolding just weeks before Trump is set to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping, a meeting Altman has suggested could produce a joint framework on AI safety standards between the two countries, going as far as to dangle the idea of a Nobel Peace Prize for both leaders if they can reach an agreement. Trump and Xi reached no such deal during their May summit in Beijing, and National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett said the White House expects to hold meetings with cybersecurity advisers this week to determine its next move. For now, Trump’s own framing of the issue, casting himself as the sole necessary safeguard and branding skeptics as traitors, leaves little indication that shift is coming from the Oval Office itself.