🔆 The US AI Action Plan: Three Core Pillars

🗞️ Issue 82 // ⏱️ Read Time: 5 min

Hello 👋

The U.S. approach to AI has taken a dramatic turn. Where the Biden Administration emphasized safety testing and careful risk evaluation, the Trump Administration's new AI Action Plan declares a different priority: "win the AI race" against China, with safety regulations framed as obstacles to victory.

Released on July 23rd, 2025, the plan explicitly presents this as a binary choice: either accept the risks of rapid AI deployment or lose technological leadership to adversaries. For business leaders, this shift creates immediate compliance challenges and strategic decisions that could define competitive advantage for years.

Today, we’ll cover what the plan says, the near-term business impact, cross-industry responses, and a few potential outcomes.

What the Plan Says

America’s AI Action Plan organizes around three core pillars:

Pillar I: Accelerate AI Innovation focuses on removing regulatory barriers:

• Rescinding Biden-era AI safety requirements

• Updating federal procurement to exclude AI systems that reference "misinformation, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion, and climate change."

• Cutting federal funding to states with "burdensome AI regulations"

• Encouraging open-source and open-weight AI

🚨Claiming objectivity and free speech while actively excluding references that don’t align with the White House’s views is an innate contradiction. 

Pillar II: Build American AI Infrastructure promises rapid infrastructure development:

• New environmental exemptions specifically for AI infrastructure 

• Federal lands made available for data center construction

• Streamlined permitting that bypasses traditional environmental reviews

• Workforce training programs for AI-related jobs

🌎 Want to read more about the environmental impact of AI? Check out our 3-part series.

Pillar III: Lead in International AI Diplomacy and Security targets global competition:

• "Full-stack AI export packages" for allies willing to join America's AI alliance

• Enhanced export controls on AI chips and technology to China

• Leveraging international standards bodies to promote "American values"

• Evaluating frontier AI models for national security risks

ℹ️ The full AI tech stack includes hardware, models, software, applications, and standards.

While we’re not covering this today, it’s important to know that the US AI Action Plan fits into a larger global narrative, including the subsequent release of China’s AI Action Plan.

The Business Impact: What Changes ASAP

Three executive orders were signed alongside the plan:

1. Preventing Woke AI in the Federal Government → Federal Contracting Changes:

   1. Government agencies must evaluate AI vendors for "ideological bias." This affects billions in federal contracts and creates potential conflicts for companies operating across states with varying AI regulations. Timeline: Government guidance by November 20, 2025

2. Accelerating Federal Permitting of Data Center Infrastructure → Expedited Infrastructure.

   1. Data center developers gain expedited permitting and federal land access, while facing new security requirements around foreign technology. Timeline: EPA guidance by January 19, 2026

3. Promoting the Export of the American AI Technology Stack → Deepening Reliance.

   1. Bundled U.S. AI exports could deepen international reliance on American technology. European tech businesses argue this could channel significant European investment into US industries rather than supporting European capacity building. Timeline: American AI Exports Program by November 20, 2025

Industry Reactions: The Divide

👍 Support: TechNet (aka "Tech's most powerful advocacy group") praised the plan's focus on "removing regulatory barriers to innovation.”  NetChoice called it "night and day" compared to the previous administration's "command and control" approach.

👎 Opposition: The ACLU called the state preemption effort "harmful" and legally questionable, and researchers worry that eliminating references to climate change and bias undermines scientific integrity.

What Happens Next

Business leaders face a fundamental choice:

1. Optimize for federal unregulated incentives 

2. Maintain stakeholder trust through responsible AI practices,

3. OR try to navigate both simultaneously.

The plan's most striking contradiction lies in promising "objective" AI while making explicitly ideological choices about what topics AI systems can consider. This reveals the challenge of technology governance: who defines objectivity, and should governments make that determination?

Until next time.
On behalf of Team Lumiera

Emma - Business Strategist
Allegra - Data Specialist

Lumiera has gathered the brightest people from the technology and policy sectors to give you top-quality advice so you can navigate the new AI Era.

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