Trump Justice Department weighs in on OpenAI copyright case, citing national interest

The Trump Justice Department has weighed in on a landmark copyright infringement case against OpenAI, siding with the tech behemoth over the Daily News and other news organizations for the sake of “America’s global AI dominance.”

In Manhattan Federal Court papers filed Tuesday, the DOJ in a “statement of interest” informed the court of its position on the news organizations’ allegation that OpenAI trains its large language models using reporting stolen from journalists, in violation of copyright law, a central dispute in the case. Its position mirrors that of OpenAI’s, arguing that training AI on copied materials amounts to a “transformative” use of the newspapers’ copyrighted work, thereby meeting the fair use standard.

The DOJ, which is not a party to the case, said it was in the nation’s best interest, both in terms of national security and “promoting innovation and free expression,” for the court to find that training LLMs with copyrighted works does not violate copyright laws.

The brief quoted from Trump’s executive order about “removing barriers” to American leadership in AI, citing his policy to “enhance America’s global AI dominance in order to promote human flourishing, economic competitiveness, and national security.”