White House shelves Chinese AI ban after Big Tech pushback

The Trump administration discussed sanctions and cloud bans targeting Chinese open-source AI models, according to the New York Times. OpenAI and Anthropic pushed for the restrictions, while Nvidia, Google, and Meta opposed them. Washington has paused the decision for now, with a call expected before Xi Jinping's September visit.

Why it matters: This exposes a split within the US AI industry: labs with strong closed models want China's open-weight competitors curbed, while chipmakers and hyperscalers who benefit from openness (and from China business) want the opposite. It also shows the policy is now tied to a September summit, so the ban could resurface with different terms depending on trade negotiations rather than a pure security review.