President Donald Trump signed an executive order Thursday issuing a single regulation framework for artificial intelligence, undermining the power of individual states.

The Trump administration, with the aid of AI and crypto czar David Sacks, has been pursuing a path that would allow federal rules to preempt state regulations on AI, a move meant to keep big Democratic-led states like California and New York from exerting their control over the growing industry.

There has been a growing debate over AI, specifically related to an increasing number of individual state laws that could conflict with a federal standard.

The move marks a win for tech companies, who’ve argued against states rights when it comes to regulation on artificial intelligence. 

AI companies have been ramping up lobbying, opening offices close to the Capitol and launching campaigns through a super PAC with at least $100 million to spend on the midterm elections in 2026. 

States across the country are legislating on AI. States like Colorado and California have proposed bills requiring risk assessments and disclosure related to AI. OpenAI, Andreessen Horowitz and Google are among the company lobbying to block state laws that regulate AI, arguing a patchwork of regulation across the country would prevent the U.S. ability to compete in the global AI race. 

A draft version of a proposed executive order surfaced last month, proposing a single federal standard on AI “instead of a patchwork of 50 State Regulatory Regimes.”

Sacks and fellow tech investor and podcaster Chamath Palihapitiya stood beside Trump during the signing. Following Trump’s election, Sacks was appointed as the White House AI and “Crypto Czar” to guide administration policy, while Palihapitiya maintains high-level access to White House leadership as a vocal supporter.

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Palantir expanded its lawsuit against two former employees on Thursday to include the CEO of their new artificial intelligence startup, Percepta AI.

In the suit, Palantir alleged that Percepta CEO and co-founder Hirsh Jain, co-founder Radha Jain, and a third employee, Joanna Cohen, violated their non-solicitation agreements, hiring top talent to create a competitive business.

Palantir and Percepta didn’t immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment.

The three defendants are accused of attempting to “poach” executives and developers from their former company and “plunder Palantir’s valuable intellectual property.”

Cohen and Radha Jain, who were named in the original lawsuit filed in October, were previously senior engineers at Palantir. Hirsh Jain, an executive responsible for the company’s healthcare portfolio, was added as another defendant in the latest complaint.

Palantir said the defendants were “entrusted” with the company’s “crown jewels,” including source code, customer workflows and proprietary customer engagement strategies.

The former employees “brazenly disregarded their contractual and legal commitments to Palantir and instead chose a path of deception and unjust competition,” the plaintiffs said in the document, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Cohen and Radha Jain denied the initial allegations in a November filing, and agreed to stop working for Percepta during the proceedings.

The suit accused Hirsh Jain, who resigned from Palantir in August 2024, of an “aggressive campaign” to recruit other employees to join Percepta, and said the startup has already hired at least 10 former Palantir employees.

An alleged message written by Hirsh Jain in November 2024 read, “I’m down to pillage the best devs at palantir when they’re at their maximum richness.”

The complaint says Rhada Jain wrote another message saying, “God thinking about poaching is so fun.”

Palantir, which was co-founded by Peter Thiel, CEO Alex Karp and others, builds analytics software for companies and government agencies, including the U.S. military. The company’s stock price has soared more than tenfold since the end of 2023, lifting its market cap close to $450 billion.

Palantir also accused Cohen of sending herself highly confidential documents shortly after announcing her resignation from the company in March. Cohen allegedly took photos of sensitive information, the suit said, and downloaded the files onto her personal phone.

“At Percepta, they seek to succeed not through old-fashioned ingenuity and competition, but through outright theft and deceit,” Palantir said in the filing.

Among other things, Palantir is asking for the defendants to be forced to return any confidential information in their possession, and to avoid working at Percepta or venture backer General Catalyst for 12 months from the time of an order.

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President Donald Trump‘s decision to let Nvidia sell its advanced H200 artificial intelligence chips to China “sells out American national security,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., said Thursday.

Warren also reiterated her call for Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to testify before Congress about the agreement, along with Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

The senator’s fiery remarks on the Senate floor came three days after Trump announced on social media that the U.S. semiconductor giant Nvidia could sell the chips to “approved customers” in China, so long as the U.S. gets a 25% cut of the revenues.

The announcement drew concerns both from Democrats and some of Trump’s Republican allies, who have been vocal about protecting America’s hardware advantage over China in the race to AI superiority.

Warren, in Thursday’s remarks, urged Congress to pass bipartisan legislation that “reins in this administration” by imposing new chip export restrictions. Critics of the bill say it could undermine U.S. chipmakers’ competitiveness.

The Trump administration knows that China gaining access to the chips, which have previously been subject to export restrictions, “poses a serious threat to our technological leadership and national security,” Warren said on the Senate floor.

She noted that shortly before Trump announced his decision on the H200 chips on Monday, the Department of Justice touted a crackdown touted a crackdown on a “major China-linked AI tech smuggling network.”

“So why did the President make this bad deal that sells out the American economy and sells out American national security?” she asked. “It’s simple: In the Trump administration, money talks.”

“Mr. Huang understands that in this administration, being able to cozy up to Donald Trump might be the most important corporate CEO skill of all,” Warren said.

She pointed to Huang attending a $1 million-per-plate dinner at Trump’s Florida home Mar-a-Lago, and Nvidia’s later donations to the president’s under-construction White House ballroom.

“Those are just the most obvious possible reasons to cut this deal,” Warren said, “and who knows what else Mr. Huang might have done behind closed doors to persuade President Trump and Secretary Lutnick into making this dangerous concession.”

CNBC has reached out to Nvidia for comment on the senator’s remarks.