According to three sources familiar with the matter reported by independent news outlet NOTUS, senior Trump administration officials have already begun preliminary discussions with several major AI companies regarding the federal government holding equity in them. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman first proposed this concept directly to President Trump in early 2025 and has recently communicated again with senior government officials about it. The core plan under discussion involves AI companies voluntarily transferring a portion of their equity to the government, with the returns on those investments used for public purposes, including distributing an “AI dividend” to all American households. The plan is still in progress, with no formal agreement in place yet. The White House declined to comment, and the specific legal mechanisms for the voluntary transfer of equity remain unclear.
Sources made clear that Anthropic has not participated in these discussions. The talks coincide with both companies preparing for historic IPOs — Anthropic submitted a confidential IPO filing to the SEC on June 1, and OpenAI is also preparing to follow suit. If the government becomes a shareholder in major AI companies, it would transform from a regulator and purchaser into a co-owner with direct financial interests, raising concerns about regulatory independence and conflicts of interest. The Trump administration has already held equity stakes in about 20 companies through other channels, providing some precedent for this model. Political debate over the distribution of AI wealth is also heating up: Senator Bernie Sanders introduced legislation on June 2 that would force companies like OpenAI, xAI, and Anthropic to cede 50% of their equity to the government; Senator Elizabeth Warren also wrote an article around the same time advocating for taxing AI companies — though Democrats, with their minority seats in both chambers, currently lack the substantive power to advance such legislation.