🤖 Axios PM: Trump's AI order

Good Tuesday afternoon! Today's newsletter, edited by Alex Fitzpatrick, is 589 words, a 2-min. read. Thanks to Sheryl Miller for copy editing.

President Trump signed a narrowed executive order on AI and cybersecurity today, Ashley Gold and Maria Curi report.

• The surprise move comes after Trump nixed another version with stricter requirements, saying it could hurt American competitiveness.

🥫 The new order lets the White House kick the can down the road while it considers new rules for cutting-edge AI models and what to do about their cybersecurity risks.

• "Advanced AI capabilities make our Nation stronger, but also introduce new national security considerations that require coordinated action across executive departments and agencies, and components," the order says.
• "As these capabilities evolve, my Administration will continue to work closely with industry to ensure that the best and most secure technology is deployed rapidly to confront any and all threats to our country."

👾 Under the order, several federal agencies and White House officials must "develop and maintain a classified benchmarking process to assess the advanced cyber capabilities of AI models" and decide when a model should be treated as a "covered frontier model."

• National security agencies must also bolster their cybersecurity abilities and create a "cybersecurity clearinghouse."

👨‍💼 The intrigue: Former White House AI czar and current adviser David Sacks pushed for language in the new order prohibiting mandatory government licensing for new AI models, a knowledgeable source told us.

• Read Trump's order ... Get Axios AI+.

Job openings soared to their highest level in two years in April, Courtenay Brown reports from new federal data.

• It's a sign that employers' appetite to hire is improving — even if they aren't quite lowering the gangway for mass recruitment.

By the numbers: Job openings surged by 731,000 in April, their biggest monthly gain in five years.

👩‍💻 White-collar job postings accounted for most of the surge.

• That's a signal that AI isn't sapping demand for traditional office workers.

📉 Yes, but: The hiring rate fell 0.3 percentage points, to 3.2%.

• Heather Long, chief economist at Navy Federal Credit Union, wrote in a note: "The hiring rate is still low, but at least companies appear to be hunting for talent again."

Go deeper.

1. 🔎 President Trump tapped Bill Pulte, his unusually prominent Federal Housing Finance Agency director, as the new acting director of national intelligence. Pulte has built a name for himself in MAGA circles by laying the groundwork for accusations of fraud against multiple Trump foes. Go deeper.
2. 🍽️ The White House Correspondents' Association is rescheduling its annual dinner for Friday, July 24, promising "enhanced safety measures" after a gunman tried to storm the group's April event. President Trump posted that he'll be there and that it'll be held at the Waldorf Astoria, formerly the Trump International Hotel, "a Building and Ballroom that I built," when it was developed from the Old Post Office. Go deeper.
3. 🚀 Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp says the damage from last week's massive rocket explosion at Cape Canaveral was less catastrophic than first expected. Limp wrote on X: "We will fly again before the end of this year." Why it matters.

Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport is leveling up with what it calls a first-of-its-kind premium video game lounge, Axios Twin Cities' Torey Van Oot reports.

• The Portal Lounge has over a dozen stations with Nintendo Switch, Xbox and PlayStation consoles, plus custom-built gaming PCs.

🤖 A dance-happy robotic bartender named Toni even mixes drinks ordered on a nearby touchscreen.

• Go deeper ... Get Axios Local.

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