Donald Trump said he was a sufficient guardrail against rogue artificial intelligence (AI), claiming that any efforts to limit the technology was part of a “sick conspiracy”.

“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a strong and smart (High IQ!) president, and the USA has that, in spades!” the US president posted on social media.

He said that the administration has already stopped AI company Anthropic “from doing bad, or potentially bad” things.

Trump pushed back against calls by tech leaders at Anthropic, OpenAI, Microsoft and others to have greater regulation of AI to ensure it was developed in ways that promoted safety, addressed legal liability and preserved national security.

But he has opposed such efforts and claims that doing so could cause China to eclipse the United States on AI.

“There is a sick conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centres, and the only one that is happy about it is China,” Trump said.

Anthropic has endured an uncomfortable relationship with the Trump administration, with the Pentagon trying to label the company’s models a security risk and a temporary ban of one of its more advanced models.

Anthropic cofounder and chief executive Dario Amodei published a 3,800-word essay on Saturday that called for slower development of AI.

Microsoft on Monday published its own code of conduct to ensure that humans controlled AI.

The actions come after a series of warnings by AI experts about the technologies’ capabilities and the July cyberattack by OpenAI models on the AI firm Hugging Face.

Trump has long resisted efforts for greater government oversight of AI, embracing his philosophy going back to 2016 of “I alone can fix it”.

He returned to the White House last year by revoking a Biden administration executive order on AI oversight and only providing a fuller order of his own last June, more than 16 months later.

The prospect of slower AI buildout led stocks to slip in Monday morning share trading, as demand for advanced computer chips and construction materials for data centres could fall.

But Trump’s frustration comes as AI has also emerged as a political liability before November’s midterm elections, with many voters opposing the construction of additional data centres and expressing worries that AI could lead to job losses and undermine the education of children.

Rahm Emanuel, the former Chicago mayor, Democratic congressman and White House chief of staff, said on Saturday that the Anthropic chief executive’s essay was “an admission that we’re driving down a dark, winding road on wet pavement with the headlights off”.

“And where’s President Trump? Looks like he nodded off again. It’s time to turn the lights on, put both hands on the wheel, and regain control before it’s too late,” Emanuel said.

But the White House administration has repeatedly sought to minimise the risks being highlighted by AI companies.

US vice-president JD Vance told reporters on Monday morning about AI: “I don’t think Americans should be scared of anything.”

Speaking as he prepared to fly to Kansas for a midterm election campaign event, Vance said the Trump administration was concerned about AI, but wanted to make sure it was regulating the technology smartly, warning that the US was in an AI arms race against China.

“Personally, I feel a little bit weird about the fact that you have so many frontier AI tech companies kind of coming to the government and begging the government to regulate them,” Vance said.

“It feels a little bit to me like a bit of a Trojan horse.

“So, I think we just have to be careful about this.” – Associated Press