The People Have Spoken: The Tech Industry, Civil Society, and the U.S. Artificial Intelligence Action Plan

Abstract

In early 2025, the White House issued a Request for Information to guide the development of the national AI Action Plan. The responses submitted by entities ranging from Big Tech and venture capital firms to universities and civil society organizations provide an unprecedented snapshot of stakeholder expectations for U.S. AI policy. This paper examines the positions articulated in these submissions through a mixed-methods analysis combining qualitative review and natural language processing. We identified patterns of alignment and divergence across stakeholder groups and then mapped them onto a previously developed typology of AI worldviews. Our findings reveal that while the private sector broadly supports American leadership and light-touch regulation, it is far from monolithic. Civil society emphasizes the importance of risk mitigation, trust, and accountability. Understanding these competing perspectives is critical as the federal government finalizes its AI Action Plan and determines how to address the tension between innovation and public interest concerns.