Trump is blowing his one big advantage in the polls: analysis

President Donald Trump recently responded to calls for increased AI regulation by proclaiming that "the only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!" Yet as one conservative commentator pointed out on Tuesday, Trump is in fact making a politically disastrous decision by opposing AI regulation since it's the one issue where Republicans are more popular than Democrats.

"From immigration to affordability to foreign policy, the issues that propelled Trump’s comeback in 2024 have turned toxic for the GOP. Biden-era inflation hasn’t prevented the Democrats from building an 8-point lead on the cost of living amid an oil crisis and tariff-palooza," reported The Dispatch's Nick Catoggio on Tuesday. "And Biden’s support for Israel’s unpopular campaign in Gaza is now a distant memory after Trump’s Iran misadventure, with Democrats ahead by 7 points on the issue of “foreign wars” and by 11 on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict."

Catoggio added, "Somehow, across nearly every national policy priority, the most ostentatiously populist president in modern American history has placed himself on the wrong side of The People. It’s genuinely amazing. Someone should write something about it. It’s time to solve the mystery, though. The single issue on which Republicans still lead Democrats is—ta-da—artificial intelligence. It’s a modest lead of 2 points, but a lead’s a lead."

From there, the pundit pointed out that it had taken Trump "not long" to "squander" the advantage his party has on that issue.

"Numerous polls published this year confirm that Americans are bearish on AI," Catoggio pointed out. "An NBC survey taken last month found a 31-69 split when respondents were asked if they’d support or oppose a data center being built locally. A Pew poll conducted in February saw 63 percent say AI is advancing too quickly compared with 21 percent who believe it’s advancing too slowly or at the right pace."

He continued, "And when Quinnipiac asked people in March whether they think AI will do more good than harm in their day-to-day lives, opinion ran 34-55—down from 38-44 a year before. No less than 80 percent in the same survey said they were at least somewhat concerned about the technology."

The pundit also pointed out that "to be clear: That’s what public opinion looked like before last week’s 'we’re all gonna die' panic driven by employees at Anthropic, who alleged that AI could soon threaten humanity if developers don’t proceed more cautiously."

From there, The Dispatch's journalist speculated that Trump believes AI will juice up the American economy and he is prioritizing that over all other considerations, including the technology's growing unpopularity and experts' warning of existential risks to humanity.

"More so than with any other issue, Trump seems convinced that his presidential legacy will rest on how the economy performs during his tenure," Catoggio wrote. "He appears willing to try almost anything, no matter how foolish—striking a terrible peace deal with Iran this summer, pressuring the Federal Reserve to slash rates while inflation is running hot—to reduce the risk of a slowdown. His greatest fear is being remembered as the Herbert Hoover of his era."

He added, "When your politics boils down to “growth at all costs” and you also happen to be a born sociopath, the debate over artificial intelligence is a no-brainer. The stock market and increasingly the wider economy depend on sustaining the AI boom; that’s likely all Trump needs to know to support letting development continue unchecked. Who cares if there’s a 10 percent chance that the technology will kill everyone eventually—particularly if it’s unlikely to happen before he leaves office in 2029?"

From there concluded, "He’s happy to increase the risk of a mass extinction during J.D. Vance’s presidency to avert a recession during his own."

In contrast to Catoggio, President Bill Clinton's former Labor Secretary Robert Reich wrote on Tuesday that he believes the president is backing AI because of his family's financial stakes in the technology.

"So what explains Trump’s absolute refusal to regulate AI? Could it possibly be that he and his family have personal financial stakes in it?" Reich wrote. "Indeed, Donald Jr. and Eric Trump have invested substantially in American Data Centers, a firm created to support AI cloud computing and AI infrastructure."