'Full pedal to the metal': JD Vance tells Glenn Beck the admin is ensuring US dominance over China in AI

Vice President JD Vance said that the U.S. is ahead of the Chinese in developing artificial intelligence but that the race to maintain American dominance is going to be critical in the coming years.

Vance made the comments in a wide-ranging interview with Blaze Media co-founder Glenn Beck on his radio show Thursday. Beck asked Vance whether the U.S. was ahead of China in the AI race, and the vice president explained how the administration is working to keep America on top.

'We don't want to meet on the battlefield of the future, and we have the muskets, and the Chinese have the M-16s. I think AI is a critical part of staying ahead of the Chinese.'

"I think that we're ahead, Glenn, but no one who says we're way ahead should be believed," said Vance.

"In artificial intelligence, six months is a lifetime, 12 months is a generation," he added. "We're probably 12 months, maybe two years ahead of where the Chinese are when it comes to critical hardware, when it comes to necessary infrastructure, when it comes to the engineering talent. But that is not very far ahead at all."

The vice president said the Trump administration is focused on policies that will develop the next generation of scientists in the field, as well as end over-regulation on energy infrastructure.

"If we allow the Chinese to catch up, we may never, ever have an edge on China in this space again," Vance continued.

"I think a lot of people [believe] artificial intelligence is a chatbot. It's something that maybe helps the college student write a paper. No, no, no. The artificial intelligence that I am worried about, Glenn, is the kind of intelligence that helps them develop next-generation weapons, that helps their rockets and missiles hit their targets 99% more accurate than the weapons that aren't using artificial intelligence," he explained.

"There are just massive defense technology implications of this," he added.

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Photo by DAN KITWOODNICHOLAS KAMM/POOL/AFP/AFP via Getty Images

Vance then made an analogy to the Revolutionary War, suggesting that the outcome likely would have changed if the British army had modern weapons and the colonists fought with muskets.

"We don't want to meet on the battlefield of the future, and we have the muskets, and the Chinese have the M-16s. I think AI is a critical part of staying ahead of the Chinese," Vance said.

"It's full pedal to the metal, Glenn. We have to constantly be innovating and stay ahead of the game," he concluded. "We can't follow the European lead of regulating. We want America to innovate, and that's what we're doing."

Here's the video of the conversation:

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