On AI, Trump Should Support Red States
February 26, 2026
Late last year, President Trump signed an executive order aimed at banning states from regulating AI. The president’s constitutional authority unilaterally to block states from passing laws to protect their citizens from powerful AI systems is dubious at best. But that did nothing to dissuade the administration’s top AI advisor, David Sacks, from forcefully campaigning for the White House to take this uncompromising path.
Sacks argued that this maneuver was necessary to target blue states like Colorado for burdening a critical industry with “woke ideology.” But recent actions by the White House show that this is a canard. The first major target of this new executive power is not Colorado, California, New York, or any other blue state. Rather, the president’s AI advisors are using the enormous weight of the executive branch to attack none other than Utah, a reliably red state, for a bill co-sponsored by two Republican lawmakers.
