“Whatever it takes.” Those were President Donald Trump‘s words when speaking about how America must lead the world in artificial intelligence. He was absolutely right.
Artificial intelligence will help determine who leads the global economy, develops the next generation of scientific breakthroughs, and sets the technological standards the rest of the world follows. The United States has every advantage needed to win that race, but leadership is never guaranteed. Like every great frontier of innovation, it must be earned, defended, and continuously renewed.
China understands what is at stake. It continues to make artificial intelligence a national priority, investing heavily to challenge U.S. technological leadership. But history has shown that our greatest strength has never been centralized planning or government control. It has always been the ingenuity, creativity, and enterprising spirit of the American people.
Artificial intelligence is no longer the stuff of science fiction. It is already transforming the way we live, work, and solve problems. Americans encounter AI every day through technologies ranging from fraud detection and medical diagnostics to precision agriculture, advanced manufacturing, scientific research, logistics, and national defense.
The United States enters this competition with tremendous advantages. In 2025 alone, venture capital investment in U.S. AI companies reached approximately $194 billion — roughly three-quarters of all global AI investment. Combined with world-class universities, national laboratories, innovative businesses, and an unmatched entrepreneurial ecosystem, our nation has the foundation needed to remain the global leader in artificial intelligence.
But winning the race for AI will require more than talent, investment, and computing power. It will also require one of the most valuable resources in the modern economy: data.
Artificial intelligence systems are only as effective as the information used to train them. Yet despite possessing some of the world’s richest collections of scientific, environmental, economic, and technical information, much of the federal government’s data remains difficult to access, inconsistently formatted, or poorly prepared for AI applications. Researchers often spend more time organizing data than using it to make discoveries.
That is why I introduced the AI-Ready Federal Data Guidelines Act, bipartisan legislation recently approved by the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee. My bill directs the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to develop voluntary guidelines to help federal agencies prepare datasets — including open government data — for use in training AI models. By improving the quality, accessibility, and usability of federal data, we can remove unnecessary barriers and give researchers, entrepreneurs, and developers better tools to build the next generation of AI technologies.
Preparing federal data for AI is only one piece of the puzzle. During our recent markup, the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee advanced a bipartisan package of ten AI bills designed to strengthen U.S. leadership in this critical sector. Together, these measures expand researchers’ access to advanced computing resources through the CREATE AI Act, increase AI security and resilience, prepare the next generation of AI talent through education and workforce initiatives, improve accountability and consumer confidence, and promote responsible innovation across the AI ecosystem.
Collectively, these efforts demonstrate how Congress can help ensure the United States does what Trump called for: do whatever it takes to remain the world’s leader in artificial intelligence.
This is the right approach. Rather than placing new obstacles in front of American innovators and businesses, we should focus on removing barriers, reinforcing the foundations of scientific discovery, and creating an environment where groundbreaking technologies can flourish. Government cannot manufacture the next breakthrough, but it can ensure researchers and entrepreneurs have the tools, resources, and certainty they need to succeed.
That is precisely what our Committee is focused on accomplishing.
Trump challenged our nation to do “whatever it takes” to lead in artificial intelligence. Meeting that challenge does not require the government to pick winners and losers. It requires policies that unleash innovation, encourage investment, enhance research, and ensure the brightest minds in the world continue to build, discover, and create here at home.
The race for AI leadership is about far more than developing better algorithms. It will shape the future of scientific discovery, economic growth, and national security. It will also determine whether the technologies defining the twenty-first century are built according to our values, not those of the Chinese Communist Party or other authoritarian regimes.
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Throughout our history, the United States has led the world because we trusted free people to solve hard problems. We put humans on the Moon, pioneered the internet, transformed modern computing, and developed innovations that changed the course of history. Artificial intelligence represents the next great frontier, and there is every reason to believe this country will lead that revolution as well.
If we continue to unleash American innovation, empower American ingenuity, and embrace the entrepreneurial spirit that has always defined our success, there is no doubt the United States will remain the world’s leading AI nation for generations to come.
Brian Babin is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, serving Texas’s 36th Congressional District.