The CEOs of OpenAI, AMD, CoreWeave and Microsoft today pressed lawmakers for minimal regulation and maximum government support to ensure U.S. AI dominance against China, Ashley reports.

The big picture: Two years after OpenAI CEO Sam Altman asked lawmakers to regulate emerging generative AI technology, the tone on Capitol Hill has shifted dramatically in favor of scant, if any, regulation.

• The Senate Commerce Committee hearing covered everything from how AI should interact with children to what chip export rules should be.
• It served an opening salvo of sorts for how this Congress is viewing AI — and how companies are shifting their postures as a result.

"I think some policy is good, but it's easy for it to go too far," Altman said, after being asked by Sen. Brian Schatz if he believes the AI industry can self-regulate at this point.

Context: Altman had been having meetings with lawmakers on the Hill ahead of the hearing, and on Wednesday he toured OpenAI's $500 billion Stargate AI training facility in Texas.

What they're saying: "Are we who are working in this industry trying to build machines that are better than people, or are we trying to build machines that will help people become better? Emphatically, it is and needs to be the latter," said Microsoft's Brad Smith.

• Smith focused on the importance of export control rules, which the Trump administration is currently rewriting.
• "Whose technology is most broadly adopted in the rest of world, in this global market ... that is who wins the AI race. Whoever gets there first, it will be difficult to supplant. We need to export with the right rules," he said.

Case in point: Commerce Chair Ted Cruz repeatedly lambasted EU-style AI regulation and suggested even guidelines for AI could stifle development.

• "Standards is a code word for regulation," he said.

Democrats pressed the witnesses on how Trump's tariff and trade whiplash has impacted their businesses, along with their views on how DOGE cuts of federal research across the government hurts AI advancement.

• "Does anyone truly have confidence that had DOGE been around decades ago, they would not have cut the project that created the internet as an example of wasteful, publicly funded research and development?" Sen. Tammy Duckworth asked.
• Microsoft's Smith said keeping public-private partnerships for innovative research is key: "We should never take this for granted. It is the foundation for the country's technological leadership."

The bottom line: It's a new day for AI companies in Washington. Safety, civil rights and moving slowly are out; beating China, dissing Europe and leading the world are in.

Here's a roundup of the bills you need to know right now.

1. The American Innovation and Jobs Act would allow companies to fully deduct R&D expenses each year and would expand the refundable R&D tax credit.

• Sens. Todd Young and Maggie Hassan re-introduced the bipartisan R&D expensing bill yesterday.

2. The App Store Freedom Act would require operators like Apple to allow people to install third-party app stores and set them as the default.

• The bill "seeks to promote competition and protect consumers and developers in the mobile app marketplace by prohibiting certain anticompetitive practices by dominant app store operators," per a release.
• Rep. Kat Cammack introduced the legislation earlier this week.

3. The Augmenting Compatibility and Competition by Enabling Service Switching (ACCESS) Act, which is aimed at making social media platforms interoperable and user data portable, is back this Congress.

• Sen. Mark Warner reintroduced the legislation yesterday along with Sens. Josh Hawley and Richard Blumenthal.
• "Interoperability and portability are powerful tools to promote innovative new companies and limit anti-competitive behaviors," Warner said in a statement.

4. The Testing and Evaluation Systems for Trusted Artificial Intelligence (TEST) AI Act would direct NIST and DOE to establish a testbed pilot program to develop and refine measurement standards to assess AI systems.

• Sens. Ben Ray Luján, Marsha Blackburn, Dick Durbin, Jim Risch, and Peter Welch reintroduced the bill, which advanced out of the Senate Commerce Committee last year.
• Luján, Durbin, Blackburn, and Risch are co-leads of the Senate National Labs Caucus.

Tech advocacy group American Edge Project is out with a new TV ad focused on the AI race with China, shared first with Ashley.

Why it matters: U.S.-China competition is at the heart of tech policy today, driving legislation and debate on Capitol Hill.

• American Edge Project says there's a seven-figure sum behind this ad spot, and it will run on cable, streaming platforms, and social media.

What they're saying: "America is in a race with China," the ad, titled "Values," says.

• "The country that dominates in both open- and closed-source artificial intelligence will define the future."
• "China's vision is driven by censorship, oppression, and control."
• "America can't lose this race to China. We must protect our competitive edge."

Context: The American Edge Project is backed by millions from Facebook-parent company Meta, per the Washington Post.

👀 AI diffusion update: The Trump administration today will scrap the Biden-era AI diffusion rule and is planning to issue new guidance within a few months, a source familiar told Ashley.

⚖️ FTC v. Microsoft: Microsoft has won its FTC appeal in the $69 billion Activision Blizzard deal, per Reuters.

✍️ BEAD letter: Sen. Shelley Moore Capito wrote to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick this week to ask about the future of the $42.45 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment program.

• "I urge you to expedite not only the review and release of updated guidance but the program as a whole. West Virginians have waited long enough, and I hope with your leadership they will soon have broadband access," she wrote.

💊 AI plus drugs: "OpenAI and the FDA Are Holding Talks About Using AI In Drug Evaluation," Wired reports.

🪄 Charm offensive: "A marketing campaign to attract US start-up talent to the EU should be set up this year, according to the board of the European Innovation Council," per Science|Business.

💡 Tech titans: America's tech titans backed President Trump's promise of a new "Golden Age" with seven-figure checks, glowing public praise and front-row tickets to his inauguration. So far, those favors remain unreciprocated, Zachary Basu and Ashley wrote in today's Axios AM.