Trump supports Flock cameras, dismisses calls for additional AI safeguards

President Donald Trump voiced support for Flock surveillance cameras over the weekend and later rejected calls for additional government controls on artificial intelligence (AI), diverging from lawmakers and technology executives who have called for greater oversight and restrictions on the emerging technology. 

Speaking with reporters aboard Air Force One Sept. 13, Trump said he supported Flock cameras because they can help law enforcement apprehend suspects.

“I sort of like them because of that, because of law enforcement, but some people don’t,” Trump said when asked whether he supported the cameras. “They think it’s an infringement, but I like them.”

When asked about the technology in August, the President said his administration was studying its advantages and drawbacks and would announce its position within several weeks. 

Flock Safety operates a nationwide network of automated license plate readers that photograph passing vehicles and record details including license plate numbers, vehicle models, and identifying features. Law enforcement agencies can then search the resulting data to locate vehicles. 

The company’s network includes more than 120,000 cameras across 49 states and processes approximately 20 billion vehicle scans each month. Flock also sells its technology to businesses, schools, homeowners associations, and other private customers, some of which allow law enforcement agencies to access their camera data. 

As Flock cameras have proliferated in neighborhoods and along highways and daily commuting routes, the technology has drawn concern from lawmakers over privacy, warrantless surveillance, broad data-sharing arrangements, and misuse by law enforcement personnel. 

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott has ordered state agencies to pause funding for additional Flock products, andwhile Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri has launched an investigation into alleged privacy abuses. The Florida Department of Transportation issued a memo Aug. 31 revoking all approved permits for license plate readers, including Flock cameras, and giving operators 30 days to remove the cameras.

>> Missouri senator announces investigation into Flock cameras <<

Republican Reps. Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Eric Burlison of Missouri introduced the “Flock-Off Act,” designed to prohibit federal funds from being used to purchase, install, maintain, operate, or upgrade automated license plate readers and surveillance cameras. 

Public concern intensified after an August Washington Post investigation found authorities had charged or accused at least 50 law enforcement officers of misusing license plate-reading technology for unauthorized purposes. The cases involved Flock cameras in 46 instances, according to the Post. 

Flock responded by announcing new safeguards, including reducing its recommended default data-retention period from 30 days to seven days, requiring case numbers for searches, and expanding automated monitoring designed to flag suspicious activity. 

An August YouGov survey of about 20,000 American adults cited by the Post found that 46% said they opposed the technology being used in their communities, while 38% supported it.

Trump dismisses calls for new AI safeguards

One day after defending the cameras, Trump argued in a Sept. 14 Truth Social post that the U.S. does not need additional AI restrictions.

“The only control or ‘guardrails’ that AI needs is a STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT, and the U.S.A. has that, in spades!” Trump wrote. 

“We already have tremendous CRIMINAL and REGULATORY power over these companies!” he added. “There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers, and the only one that is happy about it is China.”

Trump also said his administration had already stopped AI companies from taking “bad, or potentially bad” actions, specifically naming Anthropic and CEO Dario Amodei, whom Trump said is “now pretending to be a ‘perfect little angel.’” 

In February, the Trump administration ordered federal agencies to phase out their use of Anthropic’s technology following a dispute with the company. 

Trump’s post followed new warnings from Amodei and other technology executives about the pace of AI development and calls for additional safeguards. Reuters reported the warnings contributed to a Sept. 14 selloff in technology stocks. 

In a lengthy Sept. 12 essay titled “We Must Pace the Frontier,” Amodei proposed giving independent evaluators ongoing access to leading AI companies, establishing common safety standards across the industry, and requiring developers to demonstrate that increasingly powerful models meet specific safety benchmarks before advancing their capabilities.

“We must slow down the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models,” Amodei wrote.

Shortly after Amodei published his essay, Elon Musk and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in separate social media posts that they agreed companies needed to pace the development of frontier AI models. 

Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis also said in an X post that Amodei’s direction “is correct for meeting this critical moment,” but the “details need working through.” 

Public attention spiked after Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon resigned from the company Sept. 8 and said in a series of X posts that people developing advanced AI “earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.”

“They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives,” Coxon wrote of OpenAI and Anthropic. 

Trump, meanwhile, has argued that additional regulation could hinder American innovation and allow China to gain an advantage in the global AI race.

“WHOEVER WINS AI, WINS! We are leading China, and all others, and will continue to do so. Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

Vice President JD Vance expressed similar concerns Sept. 14, telling reporters that requests from major AI companies for government regulation could function as a “Trojan horse” and called for caution.

“We want to make sure that we actually regulate smartly and we’re thoughtful about the risk here,” Vance said. “There are obviously risks to AI. There are some benefits to AI. I have to say, just personally, I feel a little bit weird about the fact that you have so many frontier AI tech companies kind of coming to the government and begging the government to regulate them. It feels a little bit to me like a bit of a Trojan horse, so I think we just have to be careful about this.”