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OpenAI is proposing advancing US AI through looser regulations while placing higher restrictions on China.
Late last month, the US government launched a public consultation inviting policy ideas for its new Artificial Intelligence (AI) Action Plan.
The tech strategy originates from president Donald Trump’s AI executive order revoking former president Joe Biden’s 2023 order which aimed to create safeguards around the technology’s development.
With just days before the deadline for the consultation comes to a close, OpenAI and Google have both shared their proposals for the new AI policy, and both are pointing in the same direction – less regulations.
Looser reins on copyright
According to Google, copyright and privacy laws can “impede appropriate access to data”, which it deems necessary for training leading AI models.
“Balanced” copyright rules such as fair use and text and data mining exceptions “have been critical to enabling AI systems to learn from prior knowledge”, the company says.
It has also asked the US government to create a federal privacy regulatory framework to differentiate between publicly available data, which it can use, as opposed to personally identifying data.
Meanwhile, OpenAI wants a copyright strategy that “promotes the freedom to learn”.
“We propose a copyright strategy that would extend the system’s role into the intelligence age by protecting the rights and interests of content creators while also protecting America’s AI leadership and national security,” it says.
OpenAI says that its models are trained not to replicate work, but rather to extract patterns, linguistic structures and contextual insights. “This means our AI model training aligns with the core objectives of copyright and the fair use doctrine,” it argues.
Moreover, OpenAI says that European Union’s text and data mining exceptions for AI training, as well as the ability for a copyright holder to opt out of providing access for training will hinder AI innovation.
“Access to important AI inputs is less predictable and likely to become more difficult as the EU’s regulations take shape,” it adds.
Both companies are, however, facing a number of copyright-related lawsuits. Late last month, US edtech company Chegg in a lawsuit alleged that Google’s AI Overviews severely hurt its online traffic, “materially impacting” the company’s revenue and employees.
While in a legal battle launched by the New York Times against OpenAI in 2023, the publisher claims that AI models such as ChatGPT have copied and used millions of its copyrighted news articles, in-depth investigations and other journalistic work.
More investments, more energy
OpenAI supports solutions proposed by the Trump administration to “ensure that sufficient capital flows into building AI infrastructure in the US”, including investment vehicles such as a sovereign wealth fund, government guarantees to adopt the technology, as well as tax credits and loans to provide AI companies with “credit enhancement”.
OpenAI is already benefiting from a Trump-proposed $500bn joint venture from private investors to develop its infrastructure over the next four years.
Meanwhile, Google is asking for investments into AI to be “significantly” bolstered, “with a focus on speeding funding allocations”.
“Lowering barriers to entry will ensure that the American research community remains keenly focused on innovation rather than struggling with resource acquisition,” it says.
“For too long, AI policymaking has paid disproportionate attention to the risks, often ignoring the costs that misguided regulation can have on innovation, national competitiveness and scientific leadership.”
In addition, both companies claim that a lack of new energy supplies is a key constraint to expanding AI infrastructure. Google says that the current US energy infrastructure and permitting processes “appear inadequate”.
While OpenAI proposes new legislation which would expand transmission, fibre connectivity and natural gas pipeline construction. The start-up wants the government to streamline the planning, permission and payment processes to “significantly speed up infrastructure projects”.
OpenAI is pitting itself as anti-China
The launch of Chinese start-up DeepSeek AI’s reasoning model R1 shook the global AI community, further ramping up the AI race while pitting China as a firm competitor against the US.
To combat this, OpenAI wants the US to loosen its laws and regulations and ramp up investments into AI, with a dual goal of maintaining American leadership in the tech while thwarting China from achieving success.
“As America’s world-leading AI sector approaches artificial general intelligence, with a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) determined to overtake us by 2030, the Trump administration’s new AI Action Plan can ensure that American-led AI built on democratic principles continues to prevail over CCP-built autocratic, authoritarian AI.”
It is proposing that the US consider a modified tiered framework to differentiate between countries that will commit to America’s “democratic AI principles” and a “small cohort of countries” including China, which would be prohibited from accessing US AI systems.
In the proposal, OpenAI also wants the Trump administration to “coordinate global bans on CCP-aligned AI infrastructure, including Huawei chips”. The start-up calls DeepSeek “state-subsidised, state-controlled and freely available”, and argues that building on top of DeepSeek models in US critical infrastructure brings “significant risk”.
While Google wants the US to look into patents which were “granted in error”. The company says that China’s overall US patent grants grew by more than 30pc just last year – more than any other country.
Citing a 2013 study, it argues that the US Patent and Trademark Office could have a nearly 40pc error rate when it comes to approving software-related technologies.
The AI Action Plan is expected to be drafted by the US Office of Science and Technology Policy and submitted to president Trump by July.
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