During President Donald Trump's second term, some of the tech leaders who were critical of him in the past — including Amazon's Jeff Bezos and Facebook's Mark Zuckerberg — have tried to keep the peace with him. And Tesla/SpaceX/X.com leader Elon Musk is a major Trump ally.
Yet tensions exist within the MAGA movement. "War Room" host Steve Bannon isn't shy about attacking Musk, fearing that tech bros could undermine MAGA's populist goals. And now, Bannon is among the MAGA Republicans who is voicing his concerns about Trump's recent support of artificial intelligence (AI).
Axios' Tal Axelrod, in an article published on Thursday, May 29, reports, "The Trump Administration's embrace of AI acceleration is testing MAGA's populist roots, as fears mount of a jobs apocalypse that could destabilize the movement's economic foundation. Why it matters: MAGA leaders are engaged in a high-stakes juggling act — championing American dominance in AI while sounding the alarm over its potential to wipe out millions of jobs for young and working-class Americans. The debate is more nuanced than the Trump Administration's public posture, which has prioritized deregulation and aggressive investment as necessary to outpace China in the global AI race. "
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Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei recently told Axios that AI could eliminate half of all entry-level white-collar jobs — a warning that, according to Axelrod, "rippled through the MAGA media ecosystem on Wednesday."
On his "War Room" vodcast, Bannon told viewers, "We have to get ahead of this. Or we're going to have mass unemployment, particularly among entry-level people under 30."
Similarly, Turning Point USA's Charlie Kirk, on his radio show, warned, "What you are going to see is one of the most dramatic job displacements, and it's going to be a top issue in the 2028 campaign."
In a May 28 post on X, formerly Twitter, Kirk wrote, "For decades, elites were smug about their economic security compared to blue collar people. 'Learn to code' was the line, while globalism and offshoring hollowed out the industrial base. But now, because of AI, the jobs of elites — and their children — are in grave danger. Dario Amodei, CEO of AI firm Anthropic, predicts an AI bloodbath."
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Axios' Jim VandeHei tweeted on the subject as well.
On May 29, VandeHei posted, "MAGA leaders @charliekirk11 @Bannons_WarRoom and others join Antrophic CEO in warning of possible white-collar job bloodbath and its impact on '28 elections."
VandeHei also discussed AI during a May 29 appearance on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," stressing that within the MAGA movement, there is "deep unease" about AI — which, VandeHei told hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brzezinski, "could be really problematic for" MAGA in 2028.
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Read the full Axios article at this link.