Trump Tells 60 Minutes He Does Not Mind AI Guardrails, With a China Catch

Days after voters handed Democrats the House and the Senate, Donald Trump sat down with 60 Minutes and said three words the AI safety crowd rarely hears from him. "I don't mind guardrails." Then he finished the sentence, and the finish is the whole story.

The exchange came near the end of a wide interview with Ross Douthat, recorded at the White House on Friday and aired Sunday. According to the CBS News transcript, it was the president's first sit-down since a midterm result the network called "an extraordinary midterm repudiation," with Republicans losing not only both chambers but statewide offices in red states from Texas to Kansas to South Carolina.

Douthat pressed Trump on the doom talk coming out of the industry he has championed. He described AI executives touting their companies while warning of a 10% chance the technology kills humanity, like Trump opening a hotel and announcing it might collapse. Trump did not take the bait on the apocalypse. He went straight to Beijing.

"Because China's gonna have it, okay? So if we don't have it, China's gonna have it. That would put us at an unbelievable disadvantage. It's all between us and China. There's nobody else." Donald Trump, on 60 Minutes

Asked directly whether racing China makes the risk worth it, or whether he simply thinks the risk is not real, Trump picked a middle lane. "I think that the risk is not nearly as real as it-- as they talk. And I think the risk can be managed," he said, per the transcript.

The guardrails line comes with a China clause

Douthat then asked whether he would work with Democrats on AI safety. The transcript shows crosstalk, but Trump answered "I would absolutely" and "Yeah. Yeah." before delivering the line that matters.

"I don't mind guardrails. But I don't wanna put us in a deep second position. We're leading number one. And China has no guardrails, by the way." Donald Trump, on 60 Minutes

Read it in one breath, because Trump said it in one breath. The openness is real but conditional, and the condition is elastic. Almost any binding safety rule can be framed by an industry lobbyist as a step toward that "deep second position." Douthat countered that China has "the guardrails of being a totalitarian state," and Trump replied that there, whatever President Xi says goes. "With me, it's pretty strong, but it's not quite that strong," he added.

Reuters, in a report carried by GMA News, noted that Trump has previously favored letting technology companies police themselves rather than imposing sweeping government restrictions. The agency said his comments suggest some openness to safeguards, "though it remains unclear at what level." Nobody named a bill, a standard, or a regulator, and Trump made no promise to sign anything.

He also made clear the bull case has not budged. Asked to confirm he is "an AI bull," Trump said "I am," and tied that stance to a visit from Xi two weeks earlier. He said the Chinese leader is "all in" on what Trump prefers to call "SI," for super intelligence, because "it's not artificial." On the stakes, he was blunt: "whoever wins that race wins."

The math in Washington just changed. CBS noted that the Republican collapse gives congressional Democrats new powers over budgets, hearings and subpoenas. Trump also said he wants to work with that majority on immigration. AI safety now has a foot in the same door, at least rhetorically.

It is also a softer tone than the one critics have hammered him for. Bill Gates, for one, has publicly argued that Trump is wrong to call AI risk a hoax. On Sunday the president did not call it a hoax. He called it overstated and manageable, which is a different argument, and one Democrats can at least negotiate with.

Whether that turns into legislation depends on who gets to define "deep second position." Democrats drafting safety bills will want it to mean a real gap. The AI industry will want it to mean almost any rule at all. Trump, for now, has left the phrase wide open, and that may be exactly the point.