In June 2024, during his presidential campaign, President Donald Trump joined venture capitalist David Sacks and Jason Calacanis on the “All-In” podcast, where Calacanis told President Trump that liberalizing immigration policy would be critical to winning the AI race. Trump promptly agreed, mentioning that he will ensure all international students graduating from U.S. universities automatically get a green card with their diploma and that this will be a “day one” issue for him. That was then.
Now in his second term, Trump says he maintains his desire to cultivate American leadership in AI. He issued an executive order on his third day in office promising to remove “barriers to American leadership in artificial intelligence.” To achieve this goal, Trump tasked officials with submitting an AI Action Plan within 180 days of the order and repealed President Biden’s executive order on safe and trustworthy AI. Though both orders maintained the need to advance American leadership in AI, Trump’s had no mention of loosening immigration restrictions, standing in contrast to Biden’s order that listed attracting the “world’s AI talent to our shores” as a priority…
Judy Wang & Nicol Turner Lee, Brookings, July 21, 2025
Read the Full Article