President Donald Trump met privately with OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman backstage at the Republican midterm convention on Thursday, days after a former researcher for the company publicly accused both it and rival Anthropic of acting irresponsibly and “gambling with our lives,” according to three people familiar with the meeting.
Altman requested the meeting with the president, according to one of the people, and only a brief overview of the discussion — mainly centered on artificial intelligence and its growing power — was provided to MS NOW.
In the days since, the two men have staked out sharply different positions on whether frontier AI development should slow down.
Altman posted on Sunday night that slowing the pace “will be well worth this cost; no amount of American competitive pressure should justify recklessness, or let capabilities get ahead of alignment and monitoring.” Altman also over the weekend said OpenAI will delay going public this year, citing safety concerns.
Altman was not alone. In a rare show of agreement, he, Elon Musk and Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei each argued over the weekend that AI development needs to slow before the technology outpaces human control.
Trump struck a different note on Monday. In a post on Truth Social, he dismissed the idea of AI guardrails, saying the only control the technology requires is a strong and smart president. In a second post, he said regulating the industry would lead to “oblivion and bankruptcy,” and called AI “the greatest economic development engine in history.”
The president has long argued that regulation should not impede AI innovation. Shortly after returning to office in January 2025, he revoked a Biden-era directive that set parameters around the technology. In December, he signed an executive order that would establish a federal framework that would create a national standard and pre-empt state regulation. To win the AI race, the order said, “United States AI companies must be free to innovate without cumbersome regulation.”
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But in June, Trump signed a second order directing the federal government to work with AI developers on a voluntary framework that would give the government access to new models for up to 30 days before their release.
Altman voiced support of the executive order at the time, writing on X that the U.S. should keep building the “very best” AI models and make sure they’re “safe.”
The framework was completed by its Aug. 1 deadline, a White House official said, and the administration convened AI companies the following day to discuss it. A person familiar with the meeting confirmed that Anthropic attended. No readout was released, and the White House has not made the finalized framework public.
Trump and Altman were last seen together publicly in June, at a Group of Seven working lunch with world leaders and technology executives, where they sat next to each other.
The White House and OpenAI did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Jake Traylor is a White House reporter for MS NOW.
Jacqueline Alemany is a Washington reporter for MS NOW and co-host of "The Weekend."
Lindsey Pipia is a White House producer for MS NOW.
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