White House Issues Order Pledging to Withhold BEAD Funds From States With 'Onerous' AI Laws
Order tones down language of leaked draft, but continues restriction on dispensing remaining BEAD funds to states with 'onerous' AI laws.
WASHINGTON, Dec. 11, 2025 – President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order aimed at bolstering federal authority over artificial intelligence policy, and requiring the Commerce Department to restrict Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment funding if states’ laws on artificial intelligence are too “onerous.”
The Executive Order, "Ensuring a National Policy Framework For Artificial Intelligence," makes minor modifications to the Nov. 19 draft executive order as reported by Broadband Breakfast. The draft version contained the aspiration that a single “minimally burdensome national standard” of AI regulation would exist.
But the final executive order suggests that this is a goal to be achieved with Congress, and said that the to-be-developed framework "should also ensure that children are protected, censorship is prevented, copyrights are respected, and communities are safeguarded" – all new language added to the official executive order.
These changes do not impact the core conclusion that the National Telecommunications and Information Administration Administrator Arielle Roth must issue a policy notice within 90 days “specifying the conditions under which states may be eligible” for non-deployment funding under the $42.45 billion BEAD program.
In signing the order, Trump framed the effort as a matter of geopolitical and technological competition. “There’s only going to be one winner here," Trump said during the Oval Office signing, "And that’s probably going to be the U.S. or China. And right now, we’re winning by a lot.”
Trump linked the order to a broader effort to speed permitting for AI data centers and their power supplies, saying firms will be allowed to build their own electricity generation and will receive “rapid approvals” from the federal government.
“If they had to get 50 different approvals from 50 different states, you could forget it," Trump said. "All you need is one hostile actor and you wouldn’t be able to do it.”
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