White House Rolls Out New Action Plan to Speed AI Development

The White House released a three-part action plan Monday to speed the development of artificial intelligence in the US.

Included in the plan are steps to streamline environmental reviews for new data center construction, speeding permitting, reconsidering rules that restrict the use of chemical inputs used in semiconductor manufacturing, and promoting the use of AI within the federal government’s own processes.

The release of the plan coincides with a Monday meeting between Trump administration officials and leaders from the AI and data center industries. Some of the companies and associations represented at the meeting include Oracle, Iron Mountain, Hitachi Americas, Aligned Data Centers, CloudHQ, and the Data Center Coalition.

Lee Zeldin, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said his agency is working hard to deregulate because “there is a drastic need for more baseload power in our country, there’s a need for more innovation and infrastructure.”

“Stagnation is a political choice, and the Trump administration is choosing better,” Michael Kratsios, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, said at the meeting.

Jeffrey Clark, acting head of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, said at the briefing the second Trump administration has been removing 30 old regulations for every new one it issues.

The announcement goes hand in hand with an executive order President Donald Trump signed in July, aimed at speeding the permitting process for AI data centers. Under that order, government agencies must identify federal lands and remediated hazardous sites that could be appropriate for AI data centers.

Zeldin in February listed the goal of making the US “the artificial intelligence capital of the world” among his top five priorities.

Many environmentalists and Democrats argue the EPA has no statutory authority to promote specific industry sectors, such as AI.

“I challenge anyone to find reference to energy dominance, AI, and auto jobs in the EPA enabling legislation or in any of the environmental laws,” David Uhlmann, who led the EPA’s enforcement division under former President Joe Biden, said at an American Bar Association conference last week.