Trump’s Rush to Cut AI Deals in Saudi Arabia and UAE Opens Rift With China Hawks
Donald Trump and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman arrive at the Gulf Cooperation Council Leaders’ Summit in Riyadh on May 14.
Photographer: Win McNamee/Getty Images
President Donald Trump’s flurry of artificial intelligence deals during his tour of the Middle East is opening a rift within his own administration as China hawks grow increasingly concerned the projects are putting US national security and economic interests at risk.
The Trump team has worked out agreements for parties in Saudi Arabia to acquire tens of thousands of semiconductors from Nvidia Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc., while shipments to the United Arab Emirates could top a million accelerators — mostly for projects involving or owned by US companies. Such chips are used to develop and train models that can mimic human intelligence, and they’re the most coveted technology of the AI age.