Prediction Held up AI assessment confidence: 95% certainty 4/5 debate potential 2/5

Rory O'Driscoll: US government will not seize control of AI companies in 2025

Rory O'Driscoll · Navan Files to Go Public and Canva Pulls the Brakes: Why and What Happens? · 20VC with Harry Stebbings · Jun 26, 2025 · at 1:09:53

Rory O'Driscoll is a General Partner at Scale Venture Partners. He is responding to a Kalshi prediction market query about potential US government intervention in AI companies.

0:00 / 0:52exact quote · 52.7s
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“I still think no. I think, I just think, you know, ah any, I think the, just the push from the folks on the tech side has been very much AI for good, not AI to control it. I think all the very active tech people from David Sachs to Andreessen Horwitz, their approach has not been AI is dangerous. It is entirely corrected by the way, being in my opinion, AI is wonderful and we should make lots of it right here in America. And while it's pretty clear that the tech bros don't run the Administration. It's pretty clear that the big guy runs the administration. My guess is this is just not important enough for the big guy to give a shit. So thanks for the money, guys. In this, you can do what you want. So no, I don't think there's any impetus to say, let's seize control of Antropic or something like that.”

quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →

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