Politico reports:

President Donald Trump’s AI action plan has set off a backlash from some of the biggest figures in the America First movement — a rift expected to shape the next round of arguments in Congress about how to turbocharge the technology.

Trump’s rush toward AI is exposing an important faultline in the Republican coalition: Many of its voters and leaders deeply mistrust the power of Big Tech, but Trump himself has worked closely with industry CEOs to deliver on their priorities.

The AI argument kicked off in late July, just a day after Trump announced his AI plan — a 28-page strategy to accelerate the technology and build new power infrastructure to supply it.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) fired off a tirade on X, complaining that AI could create mass poverty by replacing human jobs, and giant AI data centers could have potentially devastating effects on the environment and water supply.

In the days that followed, GOP strategist Steven Bannon chimed in, comparing the pursuit of AI superintelligence to “summoning the demon.” And since then, think-tankers and populist conservative outlets have continued to stoke worries about federal policies that turbocharge AI development.

On stage at the National Conservatism conference in Washington in early September, Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) criticized the AI revolution as a leap towards transhumanism — a human-machine future that he said is currently against “the working man” and the teachings of the Bible, as well as installing “a rich and powerful elite.”

“Americanism and the transhumanist revolution cannot coexist,” Hawley said — a declaration met with spontaneous applause from the audience. [Continue reading…]