President Donald Trump has made it clear to tech companies that “woke AI” is no longer welcome in the government.
AP News reports that tech companies looking to sell their artificial intelligence technology to the federal government must now contend with a new regulatory hurdle: proving their chatbots aren’t “woke.”
“It will have massive influence in the industry right now,” especially as tech companies are already capitulating to other Trump administration directives, said civil rights advocate Alejandra Montoya-Boyer, senior director of The Leadership Conference’s Center for Civil Rights and Technology.
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President Trump’s sweeping new plan to counter China in achieving “global dominance” in AI promises to cut regulations and cement American values into the AI tools increasingly used at work and home.
This executive order has tied federal AI policy to ideological content, effectively banning government use of AI models that incorporate progressive frameworks like DEI or critical race theory unless users request them. In general terms, this means the U.S. is now using political criteria—not just technical performance or security—when deciding what kinds of AI systems can be used in public institutions.
“This will be extremely difficult for tech companies to comply with,” said former Biden administration official Jim Secreto, who was deputy chief of staff to U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, an architect of many of President Joe Biden’s AI industry initiatives. “Large language models reflect the data they’re trained on, including all the contradictions and biases in human language.”
One of Trump’s three AI executive orders signed Wednesday — the one “preventing woke AI in the federal government” — marks the first time the U.S. government has explicitly tried to shape the ideological behavior of AI.
“It’s 100% intentional,” said prominent venture capitalist and Trump adviser Marc Andreessen on a podcast in December. “That’s how you get Black George Washington at Google. There’s override in the system that basically says, literally, ‘Everybody has to be Black.’ Boom. There’s squads, large sets of people, at these companies who determine these policies and write them down and encode them into these systems.”
“When they asked me how to define ‘woke,’ I said there’s only one person to call: Chris Rufo. And now it’s law: the federal government will not be buying WokeAI,” Sacks wrote on X.
Rufo responded that he helped “identify DEI ideologies within the operating constitutions of these systems.”
Supporters view it as a necessary correction to bias in AI, while critics warn it could stifle innovation, distort research priorities, and deepen political polarization in tech. As global AI norms are still forming, the U.S. now risks isolating itself from allies promoting inclusive, rights-based approaches. This move sets a precedent that future administrations, regardless of party, may feel pressured to follow.
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But some, who agreed that Biden went too far promoting DEI, also worry that Trump’s new order sets a bad precedent for future government efforts to shape AI’s politics.
“The whole idea of achieving ideological neutrality with AI models is really just unworkable,” said Ryan Hauser of the Mercatus Center, a free-market think tank. “And what do we get? We get these frontier labs just changing their speech to meet the political requirements of the moment.”
White House statement overview:
The order directs federal agencies to procure only large language models (LLMs) that comply with two Unbiased AI Principles: (1) Truth-seeking – AI must prioritize historical accuracy, scientific objectivity, and acknowledge uncertainty; and (2) Ideological Neutrality – AI must not embed partisan or ideological biases such as DEI, unless explicitly prompted by the user.
The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is tasked to issue guidance within 120 days to help agencies implement these principles, including contract revisions that require compliance. Agencies must update existing and future contracts to enforce these standards, with penalties for noncompliance. The order aims to balance innovation with preventing ideological bias in federally procured AI systems, while allowing flexibility and exceptions for national security uses.