Silicon Valley’s AI Terminology Just Got Political

President Donald Trump’s attempt to give artificial intelligence a new name has run into a very California-sized obstacle: Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Just one day after Trump ordered federal agencies to replace “artificial intelligence” and “AI” with “Super Intelligence” and “SI,” Newsom signed an executive order directing California state agencies to keep using the familiar terms.

The timing was hard to miss.

Trump’s September 29 order said the new terminology was intended to reflect what the administration describes as the rapidly advancing capabilities and economic potential of the technology. The order applies to federal executive-branch communications, policy documents, websites and other non-statutory materials.

Trump has argued that “artificial” makes the technology sound less powerful than it really is. At a September 29 event, he described “super intelligence” as a more accurate and positive description.

The White House push also came alongside a new voluntary agreement involving major technology companies, with executives from companies including Google, Meta, OpenAI, Anthropic, Nvidia and xAI committing to additional internal monitoring, safety teams, external audits and board oversight.

California Says: Call It AI

Newsom’s order takes the opposite approach for California government.

Under the September 30 directive, state agencies are to refer to the technology as “artificial intelligence” or “AI,” rather than adopting the federal government’s new terminology.

That creates an unusual split between Washington and Sacramento over something as basic as what to call the technology.

And the disagreement is about more than vocabulary. California has also been moving toward additional rules governing how AI affects workers and consumers. On the same day, Newsom signed laws addressing issues including AI-driven employment decisions, biometric emotion recognition and notice requirements surrounding AI-related mass layoffs.

For Silicon Valley, the competing terminology is likely to be more than a linguistic curiosity. Federal officials may increasingly use SI, while California regulators, lawmakers and state agencies continue to use AI.

The technology itself, of course, remains unchanged.

What is changing is the political and regulatory language surrounding it with Washington promoting “Super Intelligence” and California sticking with “Artificial Intelligence.”