The White House and European leaders rarely see eye to eye on any issue, but they are seeking consensus on the issue of deregulating AI companies to foster gradual and more unhindered development.
The European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union, announced Wednesday that it wants to “simplify” its AI and privacy laws. The move impacts two key pieces of European tech regulation that have global impact: the first-of-its-kind AI Act of 2024 and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a sweeping online privacy law that reshaped the internet when it was passed in 2018.
As for the GDPR, this would appear to be a watered-down of data privacy laws for the sake of AI. Under the proposed changes, tech companies will have more leeway to use anonymized user data to train their AI models.
Explaining the new changes, the Commission wrote, “In the technology sector and beyond, artificial intelligence is becoming the driving force of our economies, as it provides new solutions across industries. To be able to compete in this new global market, the EU must be able to boost AI with high-quality data.”
The bloc’s broader cookie laws will also be reformed. That set of rules was to blame for the global influx of cookie pop-ups, as many companies found it easier to switch their systems entirely rather than create Europe-specific versions of their websites. If the new proposals are accepted, the EU would reduce pop-ups by allowing users to save their cookie preferences in the browser, which has been largely expected for some time.
For the landmark AI Act, that simplification would include delaying the implementation of some key aspects. Although it went into law in 2024, the act’s strict rules on AI systems that are deemed “high risk” were going to come into effect after a grace period ends in August 2026. The latest proposal seeks to delay this until “standards, specifications and guidelines are in place,” Commission Executive Vice President Hanna Virkkunen said in comments. High-risk AI includes technology that is used for profiling people in matters such as biometrics, job applications, border control and others.
These proposals are not yet law. They will first be presented to the European Parliament, where they will need qualified majority approval.
The main objective of this regulatory easing is to boost European technological competition, the Commission said, and Wednesday’s proposals are clearly only a “first step”.
While it’s not certain how much the Trump administration’s pro-tech anti-regulation push has influenced the European Commission’s thinking, one official wasn’t afraid to make the connection.
“Nobody is fooled by the transatlantic origins of these efforts,” Thierry Breton, former EU internal market commissioner, wrote in an op-ed published by the Guardian. “We cannot allow ourselves to be intimidated.”
President Trump has characterized EU efforts to regulate US technology as “foreign extortion” and has made fighting it a central point of his trade offensive against the EU. In this fight, the giants of Silicon Valley are standing ten feet behind him.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said before Trump’s inauguration in January, “The number of laws institutionalizing censorship in Europe is constantly increasing and making it difficult to create anything innovative there.” “We’re going to work with President Trump to push back against governments around the world that are going after American companies.”
Meanwhile, it has been a good day for AI companies in the states too.
Republicans are seeking a moratorium on state AI laws, either as a standalone bill or added to the National Defense Authorization Act, which is likely to be finalized soon and voted on next month. Trump posted in support of it on his Truth Social account Tuesday night, saying “We should have one federal standard instead of 50 state regulatory regimes.”
However, it is not clear whether the adjournment request will pass or not. A similar Republican effort to add a moratorium to the Big Beautiful bill failed, mostly due to concerns that it would help AI companies avoid regulation on child protection laws.
But in his second term, Trump has not been a fan of waiting for the advice and consent of Congress. On Wednesday, The Verge obtained a draft of an executive order, which is expected to be signed by the president on Friday. The order would create an “AI Litigation Task Force” charged with suing states over laws that hinder the progress of Big Tech’s AI development.
But this time, while Congress is considering that moratorium, a pro-AI group is forming on the sidelines. According to Axios, Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema will co-chair a new group that wants to “push back” scrutiny of the AI industry. The organization, called the AI Infrastructure Coalition, will officially launch on Wednesday evening. Members reportedly include the usual AI supporter suspects like Andreessen Horowitz, Cisco, Meta, Google, Microsoft, and some energy companies.