How AI risks are deepening divisions across Silicon Valley and Washington

The people building and governing AI increasingly fall into camps: Those who want to slow down and regulate development, those racing to speed it up and those in between or with shifting stances

In the last week, calls to slow the development of artificial intelligence have moved to the center of the national agenda. What began as a philosophical question (how dangerous might this technology become?) has hardened into increasingly entrenched rival factions.

One side is warning that the technology is advancing faster than humans can control it. Another is treating the race for dominance against competitors at home and abroad as the only risk that counts. A third group in the middle is pressing for guardrails that would neither halt the development of AI nor wave it through — and a handful of prominent voices have shifted sides as the technology has changed.

The divisions are increasingly defining the debate over AI, and they do not follow familiar lines. The dispute has split Silicon Valley, setting technology executives against President Trump, who has rejected their calls to slow down and united populists on the left and right who agree on little else but that AI should be reined in.

The outcome will shape more than just the industry. Whichever side prevails will influence how AI enters daily life and which nation sets those rules for everyone else. So far, no camp has triumphed and the technology continues to advance.

The New York Times mapped many of the people driving that fight: building the systems, funding them or deciding whether the government steps in.