On this episode of the Washington AI Network Podcast, recorded live at the Special Competitive Studies Project’s AI+Expo, host Tammy Haddad interviews Silverado Policy Accelerator co-founder and executive chair Maureen Hinman about the high-stakes race to power America’s AI future. As Congress weighs the 269-page Great American Artificial Intelligence Act and the nation faces an AI-driven energy demand surge, Hinman issues a stark warning: America&#x27;s ability to lead in artificial intelligence depends not just on software and models, but on solving foundational problems in energy infrastructure, critical minerals supply chains, and a permitting system built for a different era.

Silverado Policy Accelerator's Maureen Hinman: A Trade Veteran’s Blueprint for U.S. AI Competitiveness 

Washington AI Network with Tammy Haddad

# Full Transcript

**Podcast:** Washington AI Network with Tammy Haddad

## Participants

- **Tammy Haddad** (Washington AI Network)
- **Maureen Hinman** ( Silverado Policy Accelerator)

## Transcript

Hello and thanks for listening to the Washington AI Network podcast. I'm your host Tammy Haddad, the founder of the Washington AI Network. You're about to hear a conversation that took place at the Special Competitive Studies Projects AI Expo, featuring Silverado Policy Accelerator co-founder and executive chair Maureen Hinman. She's a veteran of the Commerce Department, where she traveled the world representing the United States on global trade negotiations.

From Critical Minerals to the Environment. We talked about all of that, including, of course, competition with China. Enjoy. Okay, everyone, here we are at Special Competitive Studies Projects AI Expo. Let's hear it. Yes, and you are cheering for the right person because Maureen Hinman is my guest. Maureen is USTR veteran and everyone knows what that is here. I don't need to explain that.

Maureen Hinman, she's the Executive Chair of the Silverado Policy Accelerator. Congratulations on that. And I'm so glad to have you here. I had the honor of going to your conference last week and you gave this report on where things are in America with American security, with trade, with so many issues. And I'd really like to start right there and bring us up to date on where we are and then we can talk about what you see in the future. Okay, sure. That's not wide enough, is it? No, fire away.

Well, you specifically talked about the challenges that the U.S. has. Some we're doing well in, some that we're not doing well in. But let's start with trade. Look, you know, I think that what the average man on the street doesn't understand about trade is that aside from some of the noise around the tariff war, we're going through a global transformation in how we do trade policy.

And a lot of that is because the existing systems are really designed for market economies and for democracies. And we have very large economies in the system now that are neither.

And in order to have a set of rules that is predictable, that is companies can bank on, that is fair, most importantly, and that creates value for those market economies, the rules need to be adjusted. And so the first thing one needs to do is to build some leverage.

And so you've seen that both in regards to this sort of like number soup, I like to say, on investigations and tariff actions, whether it's 301, 232, 201. Write that down, 301, 232, 201. Okay, keep going. It's not my phone number, I promise. You don't want that anyways. But so the first thing one needs to do is both build leverage and set a fact pattern.

And I think that, you know, Ambassador Greer, both in this, who's the USTR, both in this administration and his role in the previous Trump administration, and frankly, a lot of these policies were carried through the Biden administration, has be...

Silverado Policy Accelerator's Maureen Hinman: A Trade Veteran’s Blueprint for U.S. AI Competitiveness

Transcript

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Silverado Policy Accelerator's Maureen Hinman: A Trade Veteran’s Blueprint for U.S. AI Competitiveness

Transcript

Built for investment professionals

Every day you wait, your competitors are findingedge in conversations you're not hearing.

Every day you wait, your competitors are finding
edge in conversations you're not hearing.