The White House proved today that embracing AI is a winning message

The last week has been full of fear-mongering: Bill Gates warning AI could cause “a billion deaths,” on Meet The Press, Anthropic once again touting its tech as posing “catastrophic or existential risks to humanity” in its filing ahead of a possible IPO, and even SNL calling out Dario Amodei’s doomerism.But this week the White House is countering that narrative by showing Americans what AI can actually do for them — get a passport without waiting months for an appointment and trekking to some office, sign up for Medicare, check on student loan payments, and search for a federal job.“This kind of innovation in government is just a preview of what is possible with super intelligence,” Trump said.On Tuesday, at an event that felt less like a bureaucratic symposium and more like an Apple keynote, the federal government demonstrated how it is using AI on its newly unveiled and elegantly designed website, America.gov.The event at the Andrew Mellon Auditorium celebrated the government’s new website, which uses AI to make federal programs more accessible and is still in the process of introducing additional features.The new website is powered by Grok and Gemini and includes a chatbot that answers your questions. And the function came together in a matter of days with invitations sent just this last week. It’s rare to see anything involving the federal government happen that quickly — let alone with a new website that looks this good, thanks to former Airbnb co-founder and US Chief Design Officer Joe Gebbia.

Of course given the 2013 Healthcare.gov rollout debacle, perhaps we should still proceed with caution — but it’s an encouraging start.Imagine actually being able to get a useful answer about taxes without dealing with the IRS or using AI to help identify fraud before taxpayers foot the bill? That would be transformative — and if today is any indication, it can happen.But the lesson for technology companies and techno optimists is that actua...