As I’ve noted many times, Trump is an economic reactionary at heart. He wants to revive industries that employ lots of burly men because he associates them with an American economy that dominated the Free World in the 1950s and 1960s. There are two notable exceptions to his backward-looking views, however: crypto, which provides opportunities for people like himself to make millions without actually doing any work or helping the public; and AI, which he wants to deregulate to the maximum extent possible. Why is AI different?
I think Trump views AI in the same way that Americans saw nuclear weapons during the Cold War; it is a new form of arms race with the Chinese that we can’t afford to lose. Promoting AI development, regardless of its ultimate implications for his voters, is a way of creating leverage against the Chinese. As a result, AI fits into two sweet spots for Trump: his desire to impose terms on other countries; and his affection for decades when America, in his view, was truly great.