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On December 11, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order titled "Ensuring a National Policy Framework for Artificial Intelligence" (the "Order"), attempting to limit state laws that regulate artificial intelligence. The stated purpose of the Order is to "promote United States national and economic security and dominance across many domains," and it seeks to create a "minimally burdensome national standard" for artificial intelligence governance, forbidding any state laws that conflict with the administration's policy against burdensome AI regulation or altering truthful outputs. States have increasingly introduced artificial intelligence legislation in recent years. In 2025, all 50 states and some territories introduced artificial intelligence legislation, and thirty-eight states adopted or enacted around 100 measures.
The Order requires the Attorney General to establish an "AI Litigation Task Force" within 30 days, responsible for challenging state artificial intelligence laws that are inconsistent with the minimally burdensome standard, on grounds that "such laws unconstitutionally regulate interstate commerce, are preempted by existing Federal regulations, or are otherwise unlawful in the Attorney General's judgment." It further directs the Secretary of Commerce to identify "onerous laws" that conflict with the minimally burdensome standard and should be referred to the AI Litigation Task Force, including "laws that require AI models to alter their truthful outputs, or that may compel AI developers or deployers to disclose or report information in a manner that would violate the First Amendment or any other provision of the Constitution."
The Order threatens to withhold Federal funding under the Broadband Equity Access and Deployment Program – a $42.5 billion effort to expand high-speed access in rural areas – from states with "onerous AI laws" and requires executive departments and agencies to consider conditioning their own discretionary funding grants on states agreeing either to (i) not enact onerous AI laws, or (ii) not enforce any such existing laws. It also directs the Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission "to determine whether to adopt a Federal reporting and disclosure standard for AI models that preempts conflicting State laws." The Order further preempts "State laws that require alterations to the truthful outputs of AI models," pursuant to "the Federal Trade Commission Act's prohibition on engaging in deceptive acts or practices affecting commerce."
The Order expressly does not seek to preempt state laws relating to (i) child safety protections; (ii) artificial intelligence compute and data center infrastructure; and (iii) state government procurement and use of artificial intelligence. These exemptions are consistent with President Trump's "America's AI Action Plan" released earlier this year, which contains initiatives to build infrastructure for artificial intelligence development and deployment. They are also in-line with President Trump's prior executive order titled "Accelerating Federal Permitting of Data Center Infrastructure," which streamlines permitting and review processes, offers incentives to builders of artificial intelligence data centers, and directs the Department of Defense to use military facilities to build data center infrastructure.
Finally, the Order directs the Special Advisor for AI and Crypto and the Assistant to the President for Science and Technology to jointly prepare a legislative recommendation establishing a uniform Federal policy framework for AI, which would preempt state laws the administration deems onerous or burdensome to AI innovation and use.
On its face, the Order does not immediately preempt existing state AI laws, but sets goalposts for eventual disruption through withholding of Federal funding, at minimum. The Order is almost certain to face legal challenges from States, which the AI Litigation Task Force established thereunder appears ready to defend. It remains to be seen whether Congress will enact the uniform Federal policy framework for AI called for in the Order, which would aim to preempt state AI laws, and the Order sets no deadline for those legislative recommendations.
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