Trump's tech advisor has advice for AI companies worried they're building unsafe models: 'Just stop'

Michael Kratsios, the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Andrew Harnik/Getty Images Tech leaders say the pace of AI development needs to slow down, and asked the government to step in.

Trump's technology advisor, however, says companies don't need the government's permission to do so.

The Trump administration has broadly supported expanding and accelerating AI infrastructure.

There's a simple solution for AI companies that feel like their models are developing at a frightening speed: Hit the brakes.

That's the advice Michael Kratsios , the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, gave during an interview with Fox News Sunday.

"It's very interesting that they talk about these issues, about how scared they are about potentially where the future is, and maybe they want to do a pause," Kratsios said.

"Our position is, if you do believe that you're developing a technology that is unsafe or you don't want it out into the world, you can just stop it." He added, "You don't need someone to force you to do that." Kratsios pushed back against the notion that the US government needs to take explicit action for tech companies to take a breather.

"They just need to slow down if they feel that they need to do so," Kratsios said.

"I think the key thing to always remember is the US government has lots of tools in its toolkit to deal with these issues when they come up, and we've used them in the past." Ever since OpenAI launched ChatGPT in 2022, tech companies across the globe have become locked in a race to develop the most capable model.

Doing so could mean dominating the market and securing steady profits, a huge win for whichever company comes out on top.

OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, Google, Meta, and Microsoft are among the industry leaders.

Many Americans have expressed concerns that those tech companies are moving too fast and, in doing so, putting public safety at risk.

A Pew Research Center survey published in August said over half of the respondents were more concerned than excited about using AI more in their daily lives.