Trump wants to rebrand AI and build an 'AI Force'
The president calls AI a "Radical Left hoax" while crowdsourcing a new name — Superior, Extreme, or Supreme Intelligence — and promising an "AI Force" to defend it.
Published: 2026-09-21 Category: Quick Take
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The naming circus
Donald Trump has weighed in on the AI safety debate in the way only he can: by calling the whole thing a hoax and crowdsourcing a rebrand. Writing on Truth Social, he argued "many people think that the words 'Artificial Intelligence' are inaccurate, and very ineloquent," before posting a poll offering three replacement names: Superior Intelligence, Extreme Intelligence, or Supreme Intelligence. The poll was still open at publication time.
A couple of hours later came the pivot to politics. Trump claimed attempts at "the decimation, or destruction, of AI" are one of "many" Democratic hoaxes, lumping it in with a list that ran from "RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA" through global warming and the impeachment investigations. He insisted he "will not stand by and let this happen," framing the backlash as starting with "an attack on our Data Centers" that has now "largely failed," leaving critics to "go straight at AI."
The 'AI Force' promise
Trump said he is also creating an "AI Force" to shield the technology — though he gave no details on what that would be, what it would do, or who would staff it. The framing is consistent with his broader posture toward the industry: he killed the previous administration's AI safety executive order, and his administration has taken a light-touch regulatory line while courting investment.
Notably, Trump offered no evidence for the claim that data center and AI skepticism is manufactured rather than organic. As TechCrunch points out, suspicion crosses party lines — New York recently became the first state to halt permits for large data center projects, and the pushback has come from both Republicans and Democrats.
Why it matters
This is more than rhetorical noise. A sitting president labeling AI safety concerns a partisan hoax, while simultaneously promising a government "AI Force," sets the terms for the next few years of policy. If safety critics are cast as the political opposition, then regulation becomes framed as a loyalty test rather than a technical debate.
The rebrand suggestion is the tell. "Artificial Intelligence" carries baggage now — existential risk, job displacement, data center backlash. Rebranding it as "Superior Intelligence" doesn't change what the technology does; it changes how Americans are asked to feel about it. That's the actual project here: not naming a technology, but managing its public perception during an election cycle.
The risk for the industry is real. AI labs have spent years trying to build public trust through careful, hedged messaging about risk. A president who dismisses all of it as a left-wing hoax may short-circuit that work — and could leave genuine safety concerns, like the hallucination that nearly triggered a U.S. military strike this spring, to be dismissed as partisan fearmongering.
This Quick Take is based on reporting by Anthony Ha at TechCrunch.