President Donald Trump is going big on artificial intelligence (AI). Reportedly, on Tuesday, Trump announced up to $500 billion in private sector investment to build AI infrastructure such as data centers in the United States.
OpenAI, Softbank and Oracle are planning a joint venture called Stargate Project, Trump said in a White House briefing.
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“What we want to do is we want to keep it in this country,” Trump said. “China is a competitor, others are competitors. We want to be in this country, and we’re making it available. I’m gonna help a lot through emergency declarations, because we have an emergency, we have to get this stuff built. So they have to produce a lot of electricity. And we’ll make it possible for them to get this production done easily, at their own plants if they want.”
Trump’s position on AI has historically emphasized maintaining U.S. leadership in AI research and development, particularly for national security and economic competitiveness. His administration focused on fostering innovation while addressing potential risks, such as job displacement and privacy concerns.
SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son joined Trump for the announcement, along with Sam Altman of OpenAI and Larry Ellison of Oracle.
“The Stargate Project is a new company which intends to [build] new AI infrastructure for OpenAI in the United States,” OpenAI, Oracle, and SoftBank said in a joint statement. “This project will not only support the re-industrialization of the United States but also provide a strategic capability to protect the national security of America and its allies.”
Executives from OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle plan to invest $500 billion in the Stargate Project over the next four years. More details about the new partnership have not been shared yet.
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In the briefing, Ellison spoke about 10 data centers for the project that were already under construction in Texas. He added that more were planned for the future. Reportedly, Stargate would begin with a data center in Texas and later expand to other states.
Microsoft is also reportedly involved in Stargate as a tech partner as well as Arm and Nvidia. Middle East AI fund MGX will join SoftBank in its investment; MGX’s first public deal was an investment in OpenAI.
The new project points to Trump having recognized AI’s transformative potential in sectors like defense, healthcare, and manufacturing but advocated for careful regulation to ensure it benefited the American workforce. His approach aimed to balance technological progress with caution, ensuring AI’s growth didn’t come at the expense of jobs, individual freedoms, or national security.