What AI CEOs still don't get about Washington

Axios Axios —

AI CEOs' lofty pitches for AI governance may end up being pipe dreams in a town that routinely fumbles tech policy.

Why it matters: From OpenAI's Sam Altman to Anthropic's Dario Amodei, high-profile AI executives are eager to shape how their products are regulated and encouraged, rolling out sweeping policy ideas to manage the technology's impact.

Catch up quick: OpenAI's new https://openai.com/index/industrial-policy-for-the-intelligence-age/" target="_blank">industrial policy paper describes AI changing the world on a scale similar to the Industrial Revolution, requiring aggressive policies like tax reform or a 4-day workweek, while others have been floated by progressives for decades, such as boosting childcare.

Behind the scenes: The architects of these proposals aren't new to the policy world.

  • OpenAI's chief global affairs officer Chris Lehane has long argued for redistributing the gains of new technologies, from pitching a "new deal" for crypto to promoting policies that would spread AI's economic gains more broadly.
  • Anthropic, meanwhile is https://www.axios.com/2026/03/11/anthropic-dc-presence" target="_blank">ramping up its D.C. presence under public policy head Sarah Heck, who was previously at Stripe and worked on global entrepreneurship and public diplomacy at the White House National Security Council under former President Obama.

What they're saying: Lehane, a long-time political operative, told Axios that OpenAI is focused on promoting these policies at the state level, where there's a higher chance of success, especially in an election year when voters want to ensure they benefit from AI.

  • "There is one truism in every campaign, which is, every politician says they lead, but what they typically do is they follow where the voters are, and they will move very quickly if they see voter sentiment on it," Lehane said.
  • "We know the majority of Americans want government to take action on these issues," Heck said, pointing to Anthropic's policy positions on model transparency, economic impacts and energy.

Anthropic has also https://www.axios.com/2025/09/26/california-ai-bill-newsom" target="_blank">backedhttps://www.axios.com/2025/09/26/california-ai-bill-newsom" target="_blank"> state-level AI transparency bills to mitigate the technology's biggest risks while calling for a federal standard, saying that transparency is the first step to give policymakers and the public visibility into how systems are developed.

The big picture: Silicon Valley and Washington are often speaking different languages: One moves fast and breaks things, while the other moves slowly — if at all.

  • "Both coasts think that they're in charge," Nand Mulchandani, former chief technology officer of the CIA and of the Pentagon's Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, told Axios in an interview at the HumanX conference in San Francisco this week.
  • "But Silicon Valley now has power rivaling the power of what a government has.

    What we're seeing now is the first large fight over who's driving the bus."

While the AI industry has allies in the White House, the Trump administration has also run into limits in Washington.

The bottom line: AI companies can float sweeping policy ideas knowing they're unlikely to go anywhere, and still claim they warned Washington.

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