President Donald Trump has confirmed that in the coming days he will sign an executive order that will establish absolute federal supremacy in the regulation of artificial intelligence, effectively prohibiting the 50 states from approving or maintaining their own rules on AI.
"I am going to sign an Executive Order this week for A SINGLE RULE. You cannot ask a company to obtain 50 different permits to move forward. There has to be a single book of rules if we want to continue leading the world in AI," Trump wrote on Truth Social and X.
What exactly does the executive order include
According to White House sources and leaked documents, the order will:
Create an AI Litigation Task Force under the Department of Justice to systematically sue any state AI law deemed an 'obstacle to interstate commerce'.
Instruct all federal agencies (FCC, FTC, Commerce, etc.) to identify and declare existing state regulations as 'burdensome'.
Declare that any future federal standard on AI will have full preemption effect (i.e., it will automatically and completely nullify state laws, even those already passed).
Elevate the White House 'AI czar', David Sacks, as the sole coordinator of all federal artificial intelligence policy.
The current state mosaic that Trump wants to eliminate
Several states have already passed their own legislation in response to federal inaction:
California: SB 53 (safety and transparency of large AI models) and dozens of additional projects.
Tennessee: ELVIS Law (protection of voice and image against deepfakes without consent).
Colorado: First comprehensive AI law in the country (bias, consumer rights, risk assessments).
New York, Illinois, Texas, Utah, and over 20 other states with laws or regulations in effect or in advanced processing.
Reaction: rare bipartisan and Republican opposition
The proposal has generated an unusual coalition against it:
Key Republican governors like Ron DeSantis (Florida) and Greg Abbott (Texas) have called it an 'attack on federalism'.
Senator Marco Rubio (R-FL) stated: 'Leave AI to the states.'
Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) tweeted: 'States have the right to make their own laws on AI or anything else.'
More than 35 state attorneys general (from both parties) sent a letter warning of 'disastrous consequences'.
200+ state legislators signed another open letter opposing it.
Even Senator Ted Cruz's previous attempt to impose a federal moratorium of 10 years was rejected 99-1 in the Senate.
The argument from Silicon Valley (which does support the order)
Tech leaders like Sam Altman, Greg Brockman (OpenAI), Elon Musk, Marc Andreessen, and David Sacks himself have been calling for precisely this for years:
50 distinct regulatory regimes = impossible compliance burden.
Risk of China surpassing the U.S. in the AI race due to excessive fragmented regulation.
Need for 'national legal certainty' to attract massive investment.
What can happen now
Trump may sign the order (that is certain).
States will likely sue almost immediately (California, Colorado, and New York are already preparing resources).
The litigation will likely reach the Supreme Court, which will have to decide whether the federal government has constitutional authority to occupy the entire field of AI regulation (preemption doctrine).
As long as the process lasts (years), state laws will remain in effect.
Conclusion
We are facing one of the largest federal-state clashes of the technological era. Trump and Silicon Valley want a single, frictionless national market for AI. A broad bipartisan coalition (including many Republicans) argues that states have the right – and duty – to protect their citizens from deepfakes, biases, existential risks, and other harms from AI when Congress does not act.
The outcome of this battle will define who really controls the future of artificial intelligence in the United States over the next decade: Washington or the 50 state laboratories of democracy.
