Topline
President Donald Trump is trying to re-brand the term “artificial intelligence” as debate ramps up over industry regulation and polls show people are more concerned than excited about the impact the technology will have on society, and on Saturday asked his followers to vote in a poll with three different options for a new name.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters while aboard Air Force One on Sept. 13, 2026.
Getty Images
Key Facts
Trump, who has pushed back on recent calls to curb the exponential growth of AI models, said in a Truth Social post that “many people” think the term artificial intelligence is an “inaccurate, and very ineloquent” name for the technology.
He proposed three “far more elegant and accurate” names and asked his Truth Social followers to vote on which they prefer.
His suggestions are “superior intelligence,” “extreme intelligence” and “supreme intelligence.”
Nearly 30,000 people had cast their votes within an hour of the polling being posted, and superior intelligence” was winning as of 1 p.m. Saturday with 42% of the vote.
Trump has often tried to rebrand established terms to reshape public perception, including nicknaming mainstream journalism “fake news,” popularizing the term “deep state” when referring to carer government officials and calling COVID-19 the “Chinese Virus“ and “Kung Flu.”
Key background
In the last week, since Anthropic CEO and billionaire Dario Amodei issued a call to deliberately slow the pace of frontier AI model development until lawmakers can better regulate the industry, two distinct sides have formed on either side of the issue. Trump has fallen on the side of Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang and PCAST co-chair David Sacks, and has firmly rejected calls to slow down AI development. He argues any forced pause or deceleration on American labs is self-sabotage and will hand the proverbial kings of the AI kingdom to Chinese companies. He has dismissed public warnings of AI doom or robots “taking over” as a “HOAX“ and a “SICK conspiracy,” and maintains that formal guardrails or slowdown mandates are unnecessary. On the contrary, Amodei, OpenAI’s Sam Altman and xAI’s Elon Musk have all said AI models are advancing faster than humans’ ability to align, test and safely control them.
CRUCIAL QUOTE
“We already have tremendous CRIMINAL and REGULATORY power over these companies!” Trump posted to Truth Social. “There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China. WHOEVER WINS AI, WINS! We are leading China, and all others, and will continue to do so. Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE!”
TANGENT
There are mixed feelings around the world about the increased use of AI in daily life but, in most countries, people are either equally worried and excited or more concerned than excited, according to Pew data out Thursday that surveyed people from three dozen countries. A dual sense of concern and excitement is the most common sentiment in around half of the countries surveyed but, in Australia, the United States, Brazil and Canada, 50% or more of people are more worried than excited about AI. The survey also found that younger people are much more aware of AI than older people and their general concern is rising more sharply—since 2024, the share of Americans ages 18 to 34 who are more concerned than excited about AI has jumped from 40% to 55%.
SURPRISING FACT
Israel is the only nation in which more people are primarily excited about AI—29%—than primarily concerned—19%.
BIG NUMBER
63%. That’s how many Americans think AI poses at least a moderate risk of destroying humanity, according to a Politico poll published Wednesday.
Leave a comment