‘The scientific, technical term is BS’: Inside the new Bessent-China AI hotline

Por Megan Messerly, Phelim Kine and Ari Hawkins — POLITICO – TOP Stories

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent proposed a new AI safety “notification mechanism” during a Sunday meeting with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng.

But the proposal is far simpler than the term suggests: an open line of communication between the two officials, according to four people familiar with the arrangement.

The arrangement underscores the relatively modest ambitions surrounding AI cooperation ahead of a meeting this week at the White House between President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

Despite growing concern about the national security risks posed by increasingly powerful AI, Washington and Beijing remain locked in a broader technological arms race and are deeply divided over issues including advanced chip controls.

The proposed channel, which Chinese officials have not publicly agreed to, would allow Bessent and He to contact one another in the event of an artificial intelligence related incident with national security implications, said the four people, who were granted anonymity to share private details of the arrangement.

“The dialogue mechanism is basically Bessent and He Lifeng — it’s not a formal body of experts,” said a person briefed by an administration official.

“The scientific, technical term is BS,” said a second person familiar with the mechanism.

Asked for comment, the White House referred to Bessent’s remarks on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Monday. In that interview, the Treasury secretary referred to the mechanism as “a communications line, an incident line so that we have constant communications, especially in the event of some kind of an incident.” He also said the two countries had formalized the “USA-China AI dialogues” and agreed to meet in roughly two months in Shenzhen.

“I think the important thing was to start talking,” Bessent said.

The Treasury Department didn’t respond to a separate request for comment. The Chinese embassy in Washington didn’t respond to a request for comment, and China’s Foreign Ministry didn’t respond to a question on AI during a press conference in Beijing on Tuesday.

It is not, at least for now, a formal system for the two governments to report or jointly respond to AI threats — a decidedly underwhelming reality for those clamoring for stronger alignment between the U.S. and China on AI.

Finland’s President, Alexander Stubb and Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese have both urged Beijing and Washington this week to work together on guidelines for the safe development of AI. Those calls are likely to multiply as world leaders take the stage at the annual meeting of the United Nations General Assembly in New York this week.

“The truth is they’re the big two giants here, and so we want to see cooperation,” Albanese told Australia’s ABC News on Sunday.

But the limited scope offers a clearer picture of an initiative Bessent publicly unveiled Sunday after talks with He in New York.

Bessent, speaking to reporters after the meeting, had described the proposal as an effort to bring greater transparency to the AI race between the two countries.

“We want a shared vision of common goals and common threats,” Bessent said. “We think that just like any cross-border activity, that moving from opaque to more transparency between the No. 1 and the No. 2 AI powers in the world is very important.”

The push for a safety channel comes as Trump has resisted calls to slow AI development. The president has repeatedly framed the technology as a race the U.S. cannot afford to lose to China, arguing that restrictions on American companies would hand Beijing an advantage.

“We’re leading China in AI, we’re the most sophisticated country in the world, and frankly, I want to keep it that way because whoever wins AI, wins,” Trump told reporters during a recent trip to Ireland. “And we can put guardrails, we can do this and that. But I think you have a lot of negative forces that are bringing it up that shouldn’t be bringing it up.”

The talks also come amid growing voter anxiety about AI just weeks before the midterm elections. Polling has shown broad concern about the technology’s impact on jobs, energy costs and communities.

China has, so far, said little publicly about the proposal. Chinese state media said that Bessent and He talked about AI but did not offer specifics, as well as “candid” discussions on economic and trade issues.

Still, even a narrow communications channel would mark a step toward a more regular dialogue between the two countries on AI risk. The U.S. and China have previously discussed establishing such a forum but had not created a way to do it, and outside experts have increasingly pushed the two governments to maintain lines of communication as AI systems grow more capable.

The AI talks were one piece of a broader round of negotiations Sunday ahead of Xi’s visit. Bessent and U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer also said the two countries had agreed to begin putting into practice a separate “Board of Trade” discussed by Trump and Xi during their May meeting in Beijing, while negotiations continue over lowering tariffs on some non-sensitive goods.

Fonte: POLITICO – TOP Stories