Trump Signs Executive Order on AI

President Donald Trump used a Washington event at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium to launch America.gov, an AI-powered portal the White House calls a single front door to federal information and services. He signed an executive order directing agencies to connect their public systems to the site.

The order, dated September 29, 2026, says America.gov should not be “merely another website, search engine, or directory of Government links.” It is supposed to let a person sign in, ask a question in plain language, get an answer, and, where the law and the technology allow, finish a government transaction without hopping across agency sites.

Joe Gebbia, the Airbnb co-founder serving as U.S. chief design officer, framed the day as proof that the administration’s “golden age” talk is being built in software. “Next week is really about the golden age of America, and really getting to showcase how it’s not just a statement, it’s actually being built,” he said ahead of the event.

Gebbia said the project is about “the golden age of the citizen experience” and “a new chapter of usability for the country.” The problem, as he described it, is familiar to anyone who has tried to renew a document or find a benefit: services are scattered, forms are clumsy, and people give up.

Trump told the room the interface should feel obvious. “Anyone who has used Grok or Gemini or ChatGPT will understand instantly how to use America.gov,” he said. Gebbia later said the site is powered by Google’s Gemini and xAI’s Grok.

The president used a concrete example. A woman who changes her name after marriage now has to chase multiple agencies. “Very soon, all she’ll have to do is ask America.gov and it’ll fill out the forms, track the progress and send her a new Social Security card, passport and insurance card in the mail,” he said.

The guest list mixed Cabinet officials and industry names: Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, CMS Administrator Dr. Mehmet Oz, Elon Musk, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp, and NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. Panels covered AI, energy, health, space, and agriculture.

The executive order tells agencies to integrate public-facing services used by large numbers of people. Tax-filing systems at the IRS and certain national-security functions are carved out. Login.gov is supposed to be folded into the new front door over time.

Trump tied the launch to a broader argument that the government should stop making ordinary tasks feel like punishment. “We believe that your time matters,” he said in remarks about cutting paperwork. He also said the project is “one more example of why I will never stifle the growth of technology that will be bigger than the industrial revolution.”

Critics of rapid government AI adoption have warned about errors, privacy, and overconfidence in chat-style answers. The White House answer, written into the order, is that the federal government should do more of its own paperwork so citizens can “get on with their lives.”

America.gov is live. Whether agencies actually wire their systems into it, and whether the chatbot can complete real transactions instead of pointing users to yet another form, will decide if the launch was a product or a press event.