Winning the AI Race Part 4: Scott Bessent, Howard Lutnick, Chris Wright, and Doug Burgum

Summary

Podcast Summary: All-In with Chamath, Jason, Sacks & Friedberg Episode: Winning the AI Race Part 4: Scott Bessent, Howard Lutnick, Chris Wright, and Doug Burgum
Release Date: July 23, 2025
Host/Author: All-In Podcast, LLC

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Introduction

In the fourth installment of the "Winning the AI Race" series, industry leaders Scott Bessent, Howard Lutnick, Chris Wright, and Doug Burgum engage in a dynamic discussion moderated by Maria Bartiromo. The conversation delves deep into the intersections of artificial intelligence (AI), economic strategies, energy policies, and geopolitical trade relations. The panelists provide valuable insights into the United States' efforts to maintain a competitive edge in the global AI landscape while addressing critical infrastructure and energy challenges.

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1. Economic Strategies and the IDA333 Plan

Secretary Besant initiates the conversation by outlining the IDA333 Plan, a strategic economic framework aiming to reduce the national budget deficit from 6.7% of GDP to 3%. Additionally, the plan targets sustained economic growth of over 3% annually and seeks to increase energy production by 3 million barrels of energy equivalent.

Secretary Besant [00:34]: "We took in more revenues, some from tariffs, and we brought down spending. When I think about what we can do here, what I'm really excited about is the idea with AI that we can go back to the paradigm... and I think that growth would bring down the deficit very quickly."

The plan emphasizes leveraging AI to drive economic growth without the inflationary pressures typically associated with increased expenditure. Drawing parallels to the 1990s IT boom led by Alan Greenspan, Besant envisions a similar non-inflationary growth trajectory fueled by technological advancements in AI.

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2. AI Capital Expenditure and Economic Growth

The discussion shifts to the surge in capital expenditure (capex) within the AI sector. Secretary Besant highlights the unprecedented investment levels, estimating that major tech firms (the "big five, the big seven") are collectively spending around 1% of GDP annually—approximately $300 billion—on AI advancements.

Secretary Besant [04:06]: "The hyperscalers have obviously been in an arms race... $300 billion, wow. That's being spent on AI."

She envisions a two-phase boom where an initial capex surge transitions into a productivity-driven growth phase by 2026. This shift is expected to further reduce the national deficit and foster sustainable economic expansion.

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3. Tariffs, Trade Deals, and Their Impact on Growth

Doug Burgum raises concerns regarding the impact of recent tariff implementations and trade negotiations on economic growth. He inquires about the potential dampening effects of tariffs and addresses fears regarding China's report of selling half of their U.S. Treasuries.

Doug [07:30]: "What do you estimate the dampening effects on the growth rate to be, if any, associated with the tariffs in those trade deals?"

Secretary Besant responds by discussing the resilience of both U.S. and foreign producers amidst tariff-induced cost pressures. She notes that tariffs have spurred onshoring efforts, leading to significant investments like AstraZeneca's $50 billion plant in the U.S.

Secretary Besant [09:24]: "We're seeing this big onshoring move that I think can accelerate all that."

Regarding China's divestment from U.S. Treasuries, she remains optimistic, citing the passage of the Genius Legislation that secures demand for Treasury bills and reinforces the U.S. dollar's dominance.

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4. Federal Reserve's Role and Monetary Policy

Scott Bessent probes the conversation into the Federal Reserve's (Fed) independence, questioning whether the Fed should remain autonomous or face leadership changes.

Scott [11:52]: "Should the Fed remain independent? Should Trump replace the Fed chair?"

Secretary Besant criticizes the Fed's adherence to outdated economic thinking, especially in light of tariffs not being inflationary as traditionally perceived.

Secretary Besant [14:00]: "I think the Fed is stuck in an old way of thinking... I'm hoping that in their infinite wisdom that the..."

She advocates for a more flexible monetary policy that recognizes the unique nature of tariffs compared to consumption taxes, emphasizing the need for the Fed to adapt to current economic dynamics.

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5. Energy Policies and the National Energy Dominance Council

The conversation transitions to energy production and infrastructure, with Chris Wright and Secretary Wright elaborating on the National Energy Dominance Council (NEDC)'s initiatives to accelerate energy production in the U.S. to support the AI boom.

Chris Wright [18:38]: "We've got a huge challenge ahead of us. China is deploying everything... we're not leading on electric production."

Secretary Wright emphasizes the importance of traditional energy sources—natural gas, nuclear, and coal—over intermittent renewable sources like solar and wind, citing reliability and cost-effectiveness.

Secretary Wright [22:11]: "It can be the majority on a sunny day in the summertime. That's not what matters."

He argues that natural gas remains the fastest-growing and most reliable energy source globally, crucial for maintaining a stable power supply essential for AI infrastructure.

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6. Infrastructure Challenges and Supply Chain Constraints

Maria Bartiromo raises concerns about supply chain bottlenecks, particularly in natural gas turbines essential for powering data centers and AI factories.

Maria Bartiromo [24:15]: "How do we solve the supply chain constraints to generating the energy we need?"

Chris Wright and Secretary Wright respond by highlighting the NEDC's efforts to streamline supply chains, including leveraging the Defense Production Act and collaborating with industry stakeholders to ramp up turbine production.

Chris Wright [31:02]: "We're mapping out, talking to everybody in the industry... we're trying to jack up the supply into the supply chain."

They stress the urgency of addressing these constraints to meet the burgeoning energy demands of AI-driven technologies.

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7. Nuclear vs. Renewable Energy Debate

A spirited debate ensues around the merits of nuclear energy versus renewable sources like solar. Scott Bessent challenges Secretary Wright on his skepticism towards solar energy's reliability.

Scott [21:39]: "Why are you so down on solar? This is the cheapest thing you can install."

Secretary Wright counters by pointing out the limitations of battery storage and the intermittent nature of solar power.

Secretary Wright [21:53]: "If you take all the batteries in the United States, you can store five minutes of power..."

Doug Burgum advocates for the scalability and advanced designs of Generation IV nuclear reactors, highlighting their potential to meet massive energy demands reliably.

Doug Burgum [27:11]: "The scalability of nuclear... is unbounded... we have no effort in this country today to build and deploy Gen 4 reactors."

The panelists agree on the necessity of nuclear energy's expansion but acknowledge the current economic and regulatory hurdles hindering its rapid deployment.

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8. Geopolitical Trade Relations and AI Competitiveness

Howard Lutnick introduces a groundbreaking trade deal with Japan, aimed at bolstering the semiconductor supply chain—a critical component for AI advancement.

Howard Lutnick [35:26]: "...they paid a $550 billion, what the president likes to call a signing bonus... committed to America."

The deal structure allows the Japanese government to finance and sustain major infrastructure projects in the U.S., with profits split 90% for America and 10% for Japan. This strategic move is positioned to strengthen the U.S. position in the global AI race.

Howard Lutnick [37:39]: "They will pay for it. You net lease it to an operator, and we'll split the lease payments, 90% for you, 10% for Japan."

The discussion also touches upon broader U.S.-China relations, emphasizing the need for clear boundaries and reciprocity in trade and technology exchanges.

Howard Lutnick [44:33]: "There's below the line... we sell baby clothes and they sell soybeans. Above the line... our best chips."

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9. Workforce Development and Job Creation

The panelists underscore the significant job creation potential tied to the AI and energy sectors. Chris Wright highlights the transformative impact of AI factories and the accompanying demand for skilled trades.

Chris Wright [33:13]: "We're going to have an explosion in jobs, in the trades. You can skip college, go directly into a trade, make $150k."

Doug Burgum adds that accelerating permitting processes and fostering onshoring efforts can unlock vast economic potential, estimated in the range of $15 trillion.

Doug Burgum [35:06]: "...we have $15 trillion that's coming back."

The conversation emphasizes the importance of reducing regulatory barriers to facilitate rapid infrastructure development and workforce training, ensuring that the middle class benefits from these burgeoning industries.

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Conclusion

The episode concludes with a reaffirmation of the United States' commitment to leading the AI race through strategic economic policies, robust energy infrastructure, and dynamic trade relations. The panelists advocate for a balanced approach that leverages both traditional and emerging energy sources while fostering innovation and job creation. As the U.S. navigates complex geopolitical landscapes and technological advancements, the strategies discussed in this episode outline a pathway toward sustained economic growth and global competitiveness.

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Notable Quotes

• Secretary Besant [00:34]: "We took in more revenues, some from tariffs, and we brought down spending."
• Secretary Besant [04:06]: "That's being spent on AI."
• Secretary Wright [22:11]: "If you're not there at game time, all you are is a parasite on the systems that is there at game time."
• Doug Burgum [27:11]: "The scalability of nuclear... is unbounded."
• Howard Lutnick [35:26]: "This is the National Security Sovereign Wealth Fund, the United States of America, funded by President Trump's tariff policy that produced that kind of money, committed to America."
• Chris Wright [33:13]: "We're going to have an explosion in jobs, in the trades."

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This comprehensive summary encapsulates the core discussions and insights from the podcast episode, providing listeners and readers with a clear understanding of the strategies and debates shaping the AI race and the broader economic and energy policies influencing it.

Transcript

[Maria Bartiromo]

Secretary Besant, it's wonderful to see you. Before we maybe deep dive into AI, do you want to give us the high level Update on the 333 plan? How are things going? You had an incredible clip by the way, with Maria Bartiromo where you talked about some of the things that were happening economically. Maybe just level set everybody on what's going on.

[Secretary Besant]

So just for good framing during the campaign, IDA333 plan.

[Scott]

I think his microphone's off. Can we get the microphone on for Scott? Test, test, test. There it is.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Perfect.

[Secretary Besant]

Okay, good. So I had a plan that I called 333 and the idea was to get the budget deficit, which was running about 6.7% of GDP under the Biden administration, highest that we'd ever had when we weren't at war or in a recession, down to 3%, 3 plus percent economic growth on a persistent basis and to create 3 million more barrels of energy equivalent. So oil and gas before President Trump leaves office. And look, we're full speed ahead. We had the first June, was the first positive June for the treasury since 2015. We actually had a surplus and we did that in a good way. We took, took in more revenues, some from tariffs and we brought down spending. And when I think about what we can do here, what I'm really excited about is the idea with AI that we can go back to the paradigm. When I was younger in the 90s, Alan Greenspan was able to run the economy very hot in the 90s. And because it was the IT boom and we had this very powerful non inflationary growth and I think that it's highly likely we could have that now. And so that kind of growth would bring down the deficit very quickly.

[Maria Bartiromo]

There's been a lot of talk today about the amount of capex spending that needs to go into AI and all of the jobs that it creates. And you posted as well actually a couple days ago and you talked about that. There's just been an inflection point that you've seen in capex spending sort of as a steward of the US Economy. Can you tell us about what, what's happening?

[Secretary Besant]

So it's combination and it's a barbell. So I've been in Pittsburgh twice in the past four weeks. Four weeks ago I went with President Trump when he announced the US Steel, Nippon Steel deal. Substantial investment by Nippon Steel into an old very important industry. And then last week on Tuesday there was an AI summit in Pittsburgh. All the big players. And Pittsburgh is a natural location for AI. Lots of Cheap energy. Carnegie Mellon, Pitt are there. And so it was very interesting to see the juxtaposition there. But we are seeing this incredible capex. The hyperscalers have obviously been in an arms race. The big five, the big seven, we estimate that that is approximately 1% of GDP a year. Wow. So $300 billion, wow. That's being spent on AI. And in my perfect world, which never happens, we would go through this big capex boom and then sometime in 26, the capex boom would hand off to a productivity boom.

[Maria Bartiromo]

And it's an incredible thing because it's sort of. You mentioned alluded to this a little bit earlier, but it does violate a lot of economic theory in the sense that it just hasn't had the negative pernicious effects. Do you think is that a yet thing or do you think that we're in a structurally different kind of economy now?

[Secretary Besant]

You mean the AI boom? Yeah, well look, we've seen throughout history that technology can drive these things. If you go back, I'll talk about the ones I was around for. I was not around for the railroads, but I used to teach economic history. 1880s, 1890s, the railroads made it 10 times faster to cross the United States. We had this incredible productivity boom. It was the gigantic GDP growth and it was disinflationary. So imagine you're having double digit GDP numbers and inflation was minus 2, minus 3, minus 4% just because the costs were coming down. Then in the 1980s under Reagan, we had what I would call a deregulatory boom because hard for anyone, everyone in this room to remember, but everything used to be regulated. Price of airline tickets, the telephone bills, banking services. So 1980s we had a deregulatory boom. Paul Volcker brought down inflation, but it was also the deregulation 1990s which I previously mentioned. We had had a electronic buildup and then finally it kicked in, especially in office work. And that led to a big productivity boom. And we paid down the national debt.

[Scott]

Had a surplus.

[Secretary Besant]

We had a surplus. And I mean it seems crazy. I found a paper the other day that people were wondering well, what are we going to do if there aren't any government bonds?

[Doug]

We didn't have the.

[Secretary Besant]

But we fixed that. There are plenty of government bonds. But I do think there's a chance now that we could have this growth acceleration and if I'm shooting for 3% but I can tell you the trajectory of the debt path really changes and if we can also have lower interest rates because it's not inflationary and I think the Fed's going to have to be open to this idea.

[Doug]

So let me ask two questions on that. The first is at that the examples you gave, we didn't have some of the tariff that since we last talked several of these trade deals have been negotiated out. Further you have better clarity probably on what the tariff rates are going to be. What do you estimate the dampening effects on the growth rate to be, if any associated with the tariffs in those trade deals? And second is love to hear your point of view on the Chinese report of selling half of their US Treasuries and where's the market for Treasuries going to kind of fall over time here. So two parts to address the interest rate.

[Secretary Besant]

Yeah. So I think that in terms of the. Well I'll take the second one first. We expect that the Chinese will slowly divest but with the passage of the genius legislation last week, I think that we could see several trillion dollars of demand for T bills because the way the legislation works it's under 90 days and I think that that's really going to lock in the US dollar in terms of individuals on the street and whether it's Nigeria, Kuala Lumpur are going to be using US backed st. And if I think about the alternative, if you think about a central bank digital currency, China Euro or ECB or even Canada, a lot of you will remember during COVID the Canadian government they didn't like what some truckers were doing and they seized and froze their bank accounts. So with a central bank digital currency you could put out a mean tweet, not that any of you would have heard about it but if you put out a meme tweet no one up.

[Doug]

Here is known for doing that ever.

[Secretary Besant]

That if you have a government backed then they can shut you down as opposed to this kind of unbridled choice that consumers are going to have for US dollar stablecoins.

[Doug]

And on the first question about growth rates being hampered by tariffs is the revenue you're see offsetting effectively the rate?

[Secretary Besant]

We haven't seen that yet and I think there's a good chance that we could see. So if we think about China. So China's are China has a high tariff rate, it's 30%. The Chinese business model is like the brooms and the water buckets from Fantasia. They just keep going. And it's an employment agency, I'm thinking.

[Doug]

Of the song I know of the.

[Secretary Besant]

Piece and it's an employment agent. So they will just keep cutting costs to maintain market share. So we haven't seen that thus far. And a lot of the other foreign producers have cut price to maintain market share. A lot of the US Companies have eaten into their margins to maintain market share. And then but the other thing we're seeing is the tariffs are creating the on shoring. So you might have seen, can't remember whether it was yesterday, a day before AstraZeneca said that they were going to build 50 billion. 50 billion incredible plant here. So we're seeing this big onshoring move that I think can accelerate all that. So I think there's a very good chance that we see, just like with AI we're seeing now, we're in the construction boom phase, then we're going to be in the use case. I think we could have this massive construction boom and then the factories get populated. And part of President Trump's one big beautiful bill, the most powerful part of that is the 100% immediate expensing of equipment. And we also did it for factories. So not only are we trying to make the US the best destination regulatory wise, we're also making it tax wise. So you can immediately write off all the equipment for the next five years. You're going to be able to write off the factory structure. And I saw Secretary Bergman Wright and we're going to have cheap energy, which seems like a pretty good combination.

[Scott]

Should the Fed remain independent? Sorry, the Fed, should it remain independent? Should Trump replace the Fed chair? You know, you guys seem a bit frustrated with him. What are your thoughts there? Because you guys have done such a good job in terms of the confidence in the markets. CPI went up a little bit in June and it does seem like the economy is very strong and people are very confident. So then polymarket is showing no rate cut is the most likely case in September. So how do you think about the Fed?

[Secretary Besant]

Well, I think if you look, the Fed publishes something called the Summary of Economic Projections and it's pretty politically biased, but we're seeing that we can see 12 rate cuts this year. And I think that once we see over the next 12 months that the tariffs haven't been inflationary and I, I have breakfast with Chair Powell almost every week. And I just keep saying that a one time price level increase is very different than the notion of a persistent inflationary spir. I think that we used to say TDS was Trump derangement syndrome. I now say TDS is tariff derangement syndrome.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Right.

[Secretary Besant]

And when you think about it, the market crashed, then it had the fastest recovery in history over a 54 day, period, we're back at a new high. So I think the market's looking through all this to next year with the productivity boom. And to the question, I think minimum on a forward 12 month basis, we're going to take in at least $300 billion in tariff income.

[Doug]

Yeah.

[Scott]

Are they punishing you in a way for maybe the rollout of the tariffs was a little bit shock and awe or a little bit effervescent. However you want to describe it, it was pretty intense. Is the Fed sort of punishing you for that in your mind?

[Secretary Besant]

No, I think that they're just stuck in an old way of thinking.

[Scott]

How much should they cut? How should they think?

[Secretary Besant]

I'm only going to talk about the mistakes they made, not the mistakes they're going to make. But I do think at a point they're just going to have to kind of admit that they have been wrong. Because if you think about it, I don't believe that a tariff is a consumption tax, but if tomorrow we put on a 1% consumption tax, you would never say that's 1% inflation.

[Maria Bartiromo]

That's right.

[Secretary Besant]

I am hoping that in their infinite wisdom that the. I can't remember, it's 350 PhD economists, which I said on TV yesterday, the day before. My worry is that the Fed is turning into universal basic income for PhD economists. I don't know what they do. They're never right. If you were to maybe you should.

[Scott]

Double the number of PhDs. If you go to 700, they might get it right.

[Secretary Besant]

Well, look, I mean, if you were to look at the central value tendency versus how they done. It's shocking. It's shocking. I said, like if air traffic controllers did this, no one would get in an airplane.

[Scott]

They do seem to put a little tailspin on everything.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Last question, maybe as we wrap this up. Secretary, as an economic historian, maybe just very briefly tell us the lessons of these previous economic expansions, technological booms, what we need to learn from those things, whether it was railroads or whether it was the agrarian revolution or the industrial revolution so that we don't screw up the AI revolution. What are the few critical things we need to do Right?

[Secretary Besant]

Well, I think the most important thing that we are doing is getting out of the way and setting the conditions for it. Because I would say one of the surprises that I've had, and I've had a lot of them when I went from civilian to public servant has been that in the US we've made it so hard to build things and it's just very Frustrating. I'm sure Doug and Chris will talk about it. But this idea, TSMC wants to build a gigantic fab system in Arizona. And I think it might be able to produce up to 7% of the chips that the United States needs. And they're dealing with local building inspectors. And evidently these chip design plants are moving so quickly. You're constantly calling an audible and you're saying, well, three months ago it looked like this, but in 18 months we've now decided it needs to look like this. And you've got someone saying, well, you said the pipe was going to be there, not there. We're shutting you down. And just the level of permitting. We always talk about how. I think I may have even talked about it on your podcast, how Germany had de industrialized. We even made the decision to de industrialize through our environmental regulations. And I think the most important thing we can do is make it easy to build things again and stay out of the way and not over regulate.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Secretary, thank you. Thank you very much.

[Doug]

Thank you guys for being here. I know it's been a rushed afternoon. We did not expect the incredible turnout that we've had, but thank you both. You're the chair and the vice chair of the National Energy Dominance Council. We've talked at length today about the boom underway in A.I. we've talked about this on the podcast. The U.S. energy production capacity, electricity production capacity is about a terawatt today, growing to an estimated 2 terawatts by 2040. China's going from 3 to 8. They're adding in America every 18 months. Maybe you guys could just give us an update on the National Energy Dominance Council, how that work is going to try and accelerate energy production in the United States to help enable this AI boom.

[Chris]

Well, happy to do that. And I just want to say again, thanks to the all in for pulling together this amazing team.

[Doug]

And Hill and Valley.

[Chris]

Yes, and Hill and Valley too. Thanks, Christian. When we look back on this day, when historians look back on the challenge of our times, which is like the summit called Winning the AI arms race, I think one of the things they're going to conclude is that the reason why the United States won the AI arms race was because. Because of President Trump. And I'm not saying that as a political statement. I'm saying that the policy of the Trump administration is more energy, fast, and an understanding of how important it is for the AI arms race. And so with that, as you've just outlined, we've got a huge challenge ahead of us. You know, China is deploying everything. I mean, they added 94 gigawatts of coal last year. One gigawatts. Denver 60. Over 60% of their power is still coming from coal. They're just pouring that on. The Wall Street Journal ran an article yesterday talking about what a great job that China was doing with EVs and with solar. I read the whole article. They never mentioned coal. It's two thirds of their electrical power. And so then, just by definition, I mean, two thirds of the EV cars in China should have a bumper sticker that says powered by coal. So they are. This is a we're in a race of our lifetime. They're also doing nuclear, they're doing hydro. They've got no permitting issues. I mean, they build a hydro dam, it'd be like the equivalent of us putting a dam on the Grand Canyon, what they're doing on the Yangtze. So we've got real competition. We can lead in technology, but we haven't been leading on electric production. So the National Energy Dominance Council, part of the job that Chris and I have is helping through cut red tape, produce more electricity, whether it's hydro, geothermal, nuclear, and of course, lng. Natural gas is a key part of this. And then bringing back coal and making sure that we stop shutting down baseload in America has been a key part of what we're doing.

[Secretary Wright]

Yeah, just to riff off that, where United States gets electricity today in order, natural gas by far, then nuclear, then coal. Those three sources are 75% of US electricity and 90% of what matters, which is electricity that's there whether the sun's shining or the wind is blowing. But we had in the previous administration's plans to remove three and a half gigawatts of hydropower. We're going to stop that. There's plans between now and 2030 to close, to close 100 gigawatts of power plants. 100 gigawatts. And we're stopping most all that. Yeah, just I see the head nodding. Right. If we need to add 100 after the meetings they had this morning, I think it's more than 100 gigawatts in the next five or seven years. The first thing to do is stop subtracting 100. At the same time, you want to add 100. But I think America became great by big, bold people making big, bold investments. That's where we got here. And then we just drifted off track the last bunch of years and made it so hard to build something, so easy to stop something, and just a crazy love affair. With intermittent unreliable energy sources.

[Scott]

You're talking about solar. Why are you so down on solar? This is the cheapest thing you can install. Batteries are here and they're being produced at an incredible rate. Why are we so anti solar or why are you so anti solar?

[Secretary Wright]

I'm not anti solar.

[Scott]

Why do you keep saying then that like this unreliable solar, if you put batteries on it, it's totally reliable.

[Secretary Wright]

If you take all the batteries in the United States, you can store five minutes of power, five minutes of the entire country.

[Scott]

But if we've had many days in California and in Texas, where solar has been the majority of it. So why are you so down on solar?

[Secretary Wright]

It can be the majority on a sunny day in the summertime.

[Scott]

Yeah.

[Secretary Wright]

That's not what matters. In pjm, where we are right now, a peak demand this year, 97% of electricity, wind, solar and batteries delivered. 3%. That's when it matters.

[Scott]

If you're 20% cherry picking DC, you're cherry picking DC. Let's talk about California and Texas. These were very voluminous states in terms of population.

[Secretary Wright]

Absolutely. Let's talk Texas. So the peak demand times in Texas have been cold spells low. Their high pressure systems. In the wintertime, wind and solar go on vacation. They're 35% of the capacity in Texas, 8% of the delivered power at peak demand.

[Scott]

Talking about two weeks. I live in Texas.

[Secretary Wright]

Yeah, but Those are the two weeks that matter, right?

[Scott]

No, the other 50 are the ones that matter, actually.

[Secretary Wright]

But sure, in Uri, when they weren't ready, over 200 people died. We don't want people to die. We want the lights to go on when people need them. And it's the system cost that matters. If you're not there at game time, all you are is a parasite on the systems that is there at game time.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Let me redirect this back to AI because.

[Doug]

Good idea, good idea.

[Maria Bartiromo]

So if you actually forecast the growth of just the servers and then the robots and all of these things, we're going to need terawatts and terawatts, that's on one side. And so the obvious solution would be to build, right, to drill, to do what we need to do. And then on the other side is this latent fear that some people have that this will somehow upset the apple cart. Sustainability, the climate, et cetera. How do we create the logical bridge so that people really understand that this is all possible, that this is not going to destroy the earth and that we can get this abundant energy? Especially because, as you guys have said, Very well. If we don't do it and somebody else has marginal costless energy, they will de facto in. So how do we frame the argument so that people can understand this better?

[Secretary Wright]

Yeah, I've been writing and talking about that for 20 years and you're 100% right. And to me it comes down to the same thing AI is focused on, which is on data and facts. We've increased atmospheric CO2 by 50%. 100%. It absorbs infrared radiation. It's been a force for warming. That's all true. But if you look at the trade offs on it, it's not in the top five problems the planet focuses. And what has been the biggest source of decarbonization not just in the United States but globally has been market for forces. Cheap natural gases displace coal. And what's a lower carbon energy source? Nuclear. That's on all the time. So this administration all in to get the nuclear industry moving again. Natural gas is the fastest growing energy source on the planet. Get out of the way of that. Let natural gas grow. It's the cheapest source of electricity in the US I'm pro solar as well. I just don't want taxpayers to pay for it. I want businesses to pay for it. But solar is going to keep growing. Solar is going to keep growing.

[Maria Bartiromo]

When you talk about nuclear expansion, I just want to talk about nuclear expansion for one second. So how do we actually build these things faster, have the capability and the, you know, the technical construction, know how so that these aren't 15 year projects but also how do we incentivize the states to basically get out of the way or like, you know, these other organizations that can launch the frivolous lawsuits, slow it all down. How do we do that?

[Secretary Wright]

So a lot of regulatory firm things, one we're working on ferc, right? FERC has this inefficient queue system that just gets gummed up with mostly stuff that's never going to happen. FERC came out yesterday with a new system where you're going to prioritize things that matter. They're going to move through faster. You saw the Supreme Court decision on nepa. We got to get NEPA back to where it was a process check on the environment, not an avenue for lawfare to stop things and kill things. So there's structural changes, there's just common sense reforms. We're going to get rid of clean Power Act 2.0 that says you're going to have to have carbon Capture and Storage 15 years out on any natural gas is what's going to power AI. Let's just be honest. What's going to be the main source of new electricity in the United States? By far and away, natural gas. Just because it's cheapest, fast, it's reliable and dependable. Solar's going to play a role. Nuclear is going to play a role. Hydro, geothermal, stop closing. Coal, lots of pieces, but it's dominantly going to be natural gas. It's the fastest growing energy source, not just in the U.S. but in the whole planet. There's a reason for it. It's cheap, it's massively abundant, it burns clean. The machinery lasts longer than machinery burning oil or coal or something else. But it's let businesses. Doug and I are not here to tell anyone what to build and what not to build. We're here to get roadblocks out of the way so capitalism and consumers and investors can decide where.

[Scott]

I mean, that's the good news. Solar is cheaper than coal plants. Right?

[Doug]

So, okay, so some of the, some of the.

[Scott]

It's just a fact.

[Doug]

The scalability of.

[Secretary Wright]

Not as simple as that.

[Doug]

Yeah. The scalability of nuclear, I think is unbounded. And what we've seen in China in the past couple of years is these generation four nuclear reactors. This pebble bed reactor is probably the most elegant, beautiful energy system designed in human history. It's incredible what it can do. The scalability, the cleanliness of it, how it works. We have no effort in this country today to build and deploy Gen 4 reactors because there's no economic incentive. The path to get there is so far, the cost is so high. What can the Energy Dominance Council. What, what are you guys doing in your roles to make Gen 4 reactors? Because everyone's like, go back to the AP1000, these old Westinghouse designs from like 50 years ago and build that for nuclear. Why can't we build for the future? And what can we do to create the incentive to make this work?

[Chris]

I was going to say, I mean, the one thing that's already happened, if people are interested in nuclear, which doesn't help us in the near term race, that we're in, the near term race, as Chris said, is going to be won by us getting natural gas power online and stop shutting stuff down. But President Trump signed four executive orders on nuclear about six weeks ago and there's been a flood of capital, fresh capital coming in. We've got a bunch of venture capital going towards, you know, over close to a dozen different SMR startups. There's a lot of Interest going on in that field. Chris's work with the national labs redirecting that. I mean, nuclear's got a future, but it's not the thing we need in the next 24 months right now. That's got to keep moving ahead. President Trump's executive order has helped that, but we've got to get focused on getting more power.

[Secretary Wright]

Right now, nuclear is the single biggest issue I work on. We will have three next generation Gen 4 reactors critical in Idaho National Lab next summer. We have, we're supplying Hailu the fuel for these next generation reactors. Two, we've already committed to five, and we'll give it to a dozen of these next generations reactor companies. We worked in the one big beautiful bill to keep in the nudge the tax credits for nuclear because the government smothered the industry and killed it for three decades. Even a free market guy like me thinks we need to get a little help to get it started.

[Doug]

How far away are we till it's free market running?

[Secretary Wright]

Probably 10 years.

[Doug]

10 years?

[Secretary Wright]

10 years. Because it's just a learning curve. With the small modular reactors, you got to build up the supply chain. You got to build up and build them in volume. The cost can come down dramatically.

[Doug]

And as you, the first ones, as you guys look at your energy demand curves, do you account for this revolution happening in physical AI? Because every time I look at it's data centers this and buildings that. But no one talks about physical AI, which is batteries in robots and some people are estimating hundreds of millions or billions of these things being built in trillions. Is this part of the energy calculus as you think about demand?

[Secretary Wright]

It is. It is a meaningful part of it. And yes, the more you look at that, the more you see increased consumption of energy there. And the more excited I get, the more we can build things at scale, the better we can get the economics. One other data point we put out at the Department of Energy, we got 16 locations to build data centers. We said, who wants to come build one? We'll permit them right away. We'll help you build power generation right next to it. We got 300 responses. We will announce tomorrow the first four of those sites that will be developed and then you'll hear many more coming behind that.

[Maria Bartiromo]

How do we solve the supply chain issues around the turbines and the other enabling technologies that we need for things like NAT Gas? Because I agree with you. I have a data center project in Arizona. It's a gigawatt. You know, it'd be $25 billion of capital. But we're stuck in this weird situation where onshoring the natgas turbines are extremely difficult. Then you know, you see, certain people will just buy the nat gas entire plants and then ship them over. So how do we solve the supply chain constraints to generating the energy we need?

[Chris]

Well, I wouldn't say again, back to the immediate need. Right now we need more power and we need power for factories that are producing AI, like using Jensen's word, which I think everybody should stop seeing. Data centers. Because a data center, if you have a data center, the way America thinks about them, you're processing a shopping claim. You know, it helps the seller, the buyer and maybe a third party. If you're processing a healthcare claim, it's a provider, a payer and a patient. But in an AI, it's general purpose technology. We're actually literally manufacturing every day over and over more intelligence. And so that's different. It's not data centers, it's AI factories. And we've taken a look at nedc, at the supply chain. If any of you are trying to build an AI factory and you need power and you haven't talked to Chris and I and our team inside the White House at the National Energy Dominance Council, you need to come and talk to us because we're mapping out, talking to everybody in the industry. We're a neutral party, but we're saying here's where the shortages are. We've talked about things like the Defense Production act, we've talked to companies that are producing turbines. Everything we're doing, we say, hey, you've got to amp up because some of these people are sleeping on the sidelines and they don't think there's going to be real demand. And we're saying if anything, the demand is underestimated. So we're trying to jack up the supply into the supply chain, but please contact us.

[Secretary Besant]

We're there.

[Chris]

Think of us not. We're not a group that writes papers.

[Secretary Besant]

We're a group that helps people.

[Chris]

We help people build projects. That's what we do.

[Scott]

I can't wait to visit.

[Doug]

Just build a data center. Jake, Helen, you'll get an invite.

[Chris]

AI factory.

[Scott]

Somebody else can build data centers. We got enough data.

[Christian]

Secretary Bergman, Right. Can you, as we finish up, hit on the point we were talking about a little bit earlier, which is that you take a step back. The focus here upstream on these prioritizations from energy to critical minerals is not just you have a new market obviously on the AI side and there's huge demand and this build out is important. For national security, this build out is important for winning the AI race. But the derivative impact is what's most interesting.

[Doug]

Right?

[Christian]

These are thousands of jobs, tens, hundreds of thousands of jobs. And then on any of these manufacturing build outs, particularly in factories, nuclear capabilities, they're going to lead to usually 10x the amount of indirect jobs as well. Back to Chamas point in the supply chain for these things. Can you talk a little about the job impact now that we're seeing? And then if we're successful here in this building capacity, how many jobs are we talking about? How much, how much can we actually help the middle class here?

[Chris]

Well, it's a fabulous question, Christian, and I'm so bullish on the US Economy because as our friend Scott, who was just on here before us, but I mean you take the combination of, of lower taxes, dramatically lower regulation, accelerated permitting time, just accelerating permitting. There could be a trillion to a trillion and a half dollars stuck in this two to four year federal government permitting thing. We accelerate that expenditure of capital, the onshoring, the greatest economic developer in history, bringing foreign direct investment back to the United States. President Trump, with these tariffs, you know, what did we announce in Pittsburgh? $15 trillion that's coming back. So with AI software has always been the one thing that extended human capability more than any other in our lifetimes. And now with AI, it's just a massive multiplier of that. But to make the factory happen, we're going to have an explosion in jobs, in the trades. I mean, you're going to be able to skip college, go directly in to develop a trade, you know, make 150. Yeah, 150 grand. 120 to start in my home state. And again, and for people that are spending money on site selection, I'll tell you one thing, you want to build it faster, go to where the stranded gas is, build your power plant there, build the AI factory next to it. You don't have to permit a transmission line, you don't have to permit a pipeline. Those are the two things. Linear infrastructure has been weaponized by the people that are opposed to energy development. This country, they weaponize the blocking of those things. I say pipeline, you say protest 100%, you know, so go to the same place and co locate. President Trump himself has said in speeches, we're going to let you operate off the grid. We can build all this stuff and keep rates for electricity for small businesses, consumers down because we've got to add to the supply. But you know, which if you're going to go to where the Gas is. There's sweet places to go. The Marcellus, the Permian, or the Bakken. And you can save tens of millions hiring site selection. Guys, go find the people with stranded gas and get going.

[Doug]

Great.

[Maria Bartiromo]

All right.

[Doug]

Well, Secretary Wright, Secretary Burgum, thank you for being with us. That was great. That was great.

[Scott]

Well done.

[Secretary Wright]

Thank you.

[Doug]

Really good.

[Scott]

Nice to see you, brother. Nice to everything.

[Howard]

Guys.

[Doug]

Welcome back. How are you?

[Howard]

Nice to see you.

[Scott]

Howard. I noticed you had that incredibly smooth, refined tequila at your birthday. How was it?

[Doug]

Take us through it every 6, 14 minutes. Just. Let's get. Let's get to it. Yeah.

[Chris]

Smooth.

[Doug]

Yeah. Well, thanks for being here.

[Scott]

Great afternoon.

[Doug]

Kick us off.

[Jacob]

So the White House just rolled out a massive deal with Japan, which obviously plays a critical part of the semiconductor supply chain. Could you tell us a little bit about what the nexus is between this new, exciting trade deal with Japan and how it fits with the current debate around winning the race on artificial intelligence?

[Howard]

So it was fundamental for Japan to lower their tariff because their car industry and their manufacturing industry is fundamental to their economy. And they paid a $550 billion, what the president likes to call a signing bonus, the greatest signing bonus of all time. So they've committed $550 billion to finance projects in America that are important to the president and to American infrastructure. So we can build power means we could build 10 nuclear power plants. We could build fabs. Right. We could build critical minerals. We could do shipbuilding. Power, power, power. We could do anything, and they will finance it. And we split the profits of the project 90% for America and 10% for Japan. And I don't think people can actually understand how powerful that is. This is the National Security Sovereign Wealth Fund, the United States of America, funded by President Trump's tariff policy that produced that kind of money, committed to America. It's.

[Scott]

Will that actually go into. Congratulations. Will that go into a sovereign wealth fund that you've been talking about and the president has been talking about?

[Howard]

No, I think this is. This is separate. What the president says about the sovereign wealth fund is we do a sovereign wealth fund that invests when we're done paying off our deficit.

[Scott]

Okay.

[Howard]

Right. First we got to pay off our deficit. Some work to do before we're trying to make money. So what this is is this is the Japanese government says, I will finance and I will pay for.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Right.

[Howard]

Not finance. I will pay for. You want to build a nuclear facility? Build it. You want to build 10 nuclear facilities, you go build them. You want to go build a pipeline, you go Build it. You want to build fabs, you go build it. Whatever you think is necessary, you build it. We'll pay for it. You net lease it to an operator, and we'll split the lease payments, 90 for you, 10 for Japan. It's a blockbuster if there ever was one.

[Maria Bartiromo]

But it's an incredible deal structure. How do you get to that?

[Howard]

Well, I got to that. So this, I came up with this idea in January, and then I kept restructuring it to try to figure out how to do it, because I met with some Japanese senior executives while before election, before inauguration Day, and they said, you know, I understand your tariff policy, but Japan's never going to open, right? They're just never going to open. I mean, in 1850, Perry took an armada and tried to break it open. In 1850, he couldn't open it opened the Japanese market. So come up with another idea. And the other idea was they buy it down. And so what structure we used, how they did it, they offered us. They originally started offering us loans or loan guarantees. And the president's like, I don't need someone else to loans. I don't need to borrow money from someone else. And then finally we figured out that really it just needed to be committed capital to back projects that we want. And so it was five months in the making, and me talking to the president about doing different structures. And eventually, in the middle of last week, we came to the structure. The president said, okay, I like it. Let's bring him in and talk. And then the president made the deal better.

[Scott]

Are you going to replicate this? Is this like a new blueprint, or is it unique to Japan, which is protectionist and its own unique culture?

[Howard]

Well, I mean, the problem that Korea has is they're staring at it. You know, they view themselves deeply competitive to Japan. They both produce huge amounts of cars, they both produce huge amounts of electronics. They both do these things. And now they're looking at the price, right? And they're thinking, ouch. So, you know, how quickly did they come to see me? Let's say when we announced the deal and they were in my office today.

[Scott]

The Koreans were, oh, yeah, fantastic.

[Doug]

How much, how much have you prioritized market access for American businesses into some of these countries versus some of the other kind of trade considerations? Where does it prioritize? And we've talked about this a lot, particularly as it relates to AI And I think that part of this is in the, the action plan and in the EOs being signed later today. But this is a broader question for American businesses. I work in agriculture. It's very hard to access overseas markets and there's not a lot of parity. Has that become key to some of these conversations? And where does it sit on the priority Wrong?

[Howard]

That's the priority rule. So the rule is you must open your market. Open, open, open. And let's be clear, these markets have never been open. We have Stockholm syndrome in America. These markets have never been open. There's tariffs, there's non tariff trade barriers. Like you can't sell an American car in these locations. Whether you want to or not, you're not allowed. Or they won't buy them because the seatbelt is like this or this is like they make these rules. So we are demanding the markets are open. And the issue with Japan was they were never going to open it. So what are we going to do? And the answer was that's where he came up with this signing bonus.

[Scott]

Right, so reciprocity or something interesting.

[Secretary Wright]

Correct.

[Scott]

Something more bespoke.

[Howard]

Vietnam, completely open. Indonesia, completely open. Philippines, mostly open. Small deficit, relatively higher tariff. Right. So it's all, there's sort of a lot of levers and you pull those levers.

[Scott]

When are you going to wrap all this up? This has been like a really shocking and now I think kind of more mundane, methodical approach. So when does it all wrap up? And we can kind of put the tariff issue behind us.

[Howard]

Okay, so on August 1st, whatever hasn't been settled will be settled and the tariffs go into effect. Right. So all this 10%, they'll all just pop up to some higher number. He sent a letter to a lot of people, right. And now nothing stops them from negotiating the next day, but they're paying on that day. So that's next Friday. I mean that's not that far away. So we're very busy because a lot of people are now coming to the table with their best, best offer. But the price has gone very, very high. And let's be clear what that price is. You will open your market to America. You will open it to ranchers, farmers, fishermen. You will open it. You know, you couldn't sell lobster to all these places. Like for instance, Indonesia is completely open except for two products. Muslim country, no pork, no alcohol. Right. We're talking India, obviously, no beef. I mean you do things like that. You say, but we need it open. If they don't want it open, there's your tariff. It's 26%, 27%, 31%, 19%, whatever it is. And then if you decide to open it later, come on but that's what we're doing.

[Doug]

You'll find out over time what other kind of regulatory processes they have put in place. This is always the issue when any of us work in foreign markets. You've worked in four foreign markets. You go in and then you find out, well, there's this thing I gotta do. And this thing takes 18 months or 36 months, and they make it hard to get the permit or the whatever you need. There's always a way. Does this become like a continuous policing exercise for your department? And how does this become part of American trade? Like, is this an ongoing kind of iterative process here?

[Howard]

They've bought their tariff rate down by opening the market. So if they mess with that, they're messing with the President. And I don't know if you guys have seen him on tv, but that doesn't really work well. Okay, so the idea is he's making the deal, he's closing the deal. So the way we talk about it together is I set the table and he closes the deal. And he is the best negotiator because he's just. He's done this his whole life, and he's the President of the United States. So that's an amazing power. And he wields it to get the best deals.

[Scott]

Well, let's talk about the big issue. China. Where are we going to wind up with China? Reciprocity, TikTok, the whole shebang. Is this going to be one big grand bargain? Taiwan, TikTok. There's so many issues. Is there any way to thread the needle on this?

[Howard]

I think the way I think about China is draw a line. Okay. There's below the line. Like, they sell us baby clothes and we sell them soybeans. That stuff. We need to do more of it. We want to buy more of that. They want to buy more of ours. We need to open that. Get this detente stuff where we're just flowing below the line.

[Secretary Wright]

Got it.

[Howard]

Above the line would be our best chips. Blackwell chips. H. Two hundreds and one hundreds. We don't want to sell our best stuff. They don't want to sell us hypersonic missiles either. Right. We would say. If it was open, we'd say, well, let's take a couple of your hypersonics. Let's see what you got. So that's not happening. So that's above the line. And then the question is, what's the line? That's the proper negotiation, right? Be open. Below the line. Let's get it on good for both economies. Above the line. We're competitors. Let's just call it what it is and stick with it. And then what we can really negotiate when we're together is the line, Where's.

[Scott]

TikTok in all this? Jacob and I are both pretty adamant this is spyware. This is something that should not be on 100 million Americans phones. It is way too dangerous. They've proven themselves to use it to spy on journalists already. And the fact that they won't divest from it, I think tells you everything you need to know. They see this as a critical weapon against the United States. What do you think? What does the administration think?

[Howard]

Well, the President is reasonably positive about TikTok, provided it goes into American hands and it's controlled by American technology. Right. I think that's his view, is that they've got to be out of it. It's got to be on an American technology stack and it's got to be owned by Americans, period. And then how we work it on through there, we'll figure it out. Right now it's sort of in that straddling the line. Yeah. You're sort of staring at each other, but eventually that'll get sorted out. I think that deal will happen and America will buy TikTok, because the alternative is just shuts it off. And that just seems illogical.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Can I go back to the above the line, below the line.

[Scott]

Favorite.

[Maria Bartiromo]

Love that saying. How do you think about the. And you talked about the chips. How do you think about these export controls to various countries in various regions? What's your risk calculus about where those things should be?

[Jacob]

And if I could just actually add a question that builds on top of that, you've talked about creating AI economic zones where trusted partners could get preferential access for American technology. So could you describe a little bit.

[Maria Bartiromo]

What your vision is for that?

[Howard]

I think what we're wrestling with, and this is we're really discussing, literally the intellectual wrestle we're going through now is the idea that we are comfortable with allies buying significant numbers of chips and having a large cluster, provided that cluster is operated by an American, a trusted American operator, and the cloud is a trusted American operator. So that we know that giant cluster is surrounded by us. As you go down from there, that's where we go. Okay, if they want a smaller cluster, would you expand the number of people who are trusted? And the answer would be probably yes. And then when you go down from there to a smaller and smaller cluster, how do you deal with that? So I think it's cluster size is sort of the way of thinking rather than saying because I went to Poland and I was in Poland on a mission for the government and the prime minister of Poland chases me down and says, what did I do to America to be tier three? And I was like, I thought you were part of Europe. I didn't understand what could possibly be the issue. So I think the answer is ally or not. Cluster size and who controls it or not. I think once you sort of wrestle with those ideas and anybody who has ideas along those lines and you want to come and talk to us about it, because this is, this is really the thinking right now and we're sort of debating that right now.

[Scott]

Howard, I just want to say thank you for. It's so great to have a sharp negotiator and such a creative mind representing America. It makes me feel like really great about the 90% carry.

[Maria Bartiromo]

There may be.

[Scott]

How do we get 90% carry? I love it. Yum yum. I love said that you were a New Yorker.

[Howard]

Yeah, I am. But the negotiator in chief, New York. I grew up on Long Island.

[Scott]

Got it.

[Howard]

My kids are grown in Manhattan. But the negotiator in chief is Donald Trump.

[Scott]

That's nice that he's got you.

[Howard]

He's amazing.

[Doug]

Well, thanks for coming. We're going to make some room for the president. He's going to get ready. Howard, thank you for joining us. That was great. Thank you.