Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang Tells Trump 'We're Not Going to Let AI Slowdown Happen'

LOS ANGELES — During a live appearance at the All-In Summit in Los Angeles, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang took an unexpected phone call from President Donald Trump, publicly rejecting recent calls by leading AI executives to slow down artificial intelligence development.

Huang put the call on speakerphone in front of conference attendees while sitting alongside venture capitalists Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Friedberg, and White House adviser David Sacks.

Rejecting the 'Pacing' Proposal

The call occurred while the panel was actively discussing a recent proposal by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who urged the industry to "pace the frontier" and deliberately slow the rate of AI capability improvements. While top industry leaders including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and xAI founder Elon Musk publicly supported Amodei's caution, Huang and Trump voiced sharp opposition.

Addressing the audience through the stage microphones, Trump characterized the push to slow down AI capabilities as counterproductive to American interests.

"They're just playing right in the hands of a lot of people that don't want to see it happen," Trump told Huang during the call. "That could be political people. It could also be China. And we're not going to let that happen."

"You're right. We're not going to let that happen, sir," Huang responded to applause from the audience.

Industry Split Over AI Speed vs. Safety

The exchange highlights a widening rift within the tech sector over the velocity of frontier model development:

• The Pacing Camp: Anthropic, OpenAI, and xAI have backed calls for embedded third-party safety evaluators and voluntary rate limits on unchecked progress.

• The Acceleration Camp: Nvidia and key hardware investors argue that slowing development risks forfeiting technical leadership to foreign rivals and stifling economic momentum.

As the leading supplier of AI hardware, Nvidia remains at the center of the global buildout. Huang's direct alignment with the administration signals that hardware development and infrastructure scaling are unlikely to decelerate, despite escalating warnings from safety researchers.