Morning Wire - Inside America’s Nuclear Comeback & AI Revolution

Episode Date: May 18, 2025

Daily Wire Senior Editor Cabot Phillips joins Energy Secretary Chris Wright, other top officials and tech leaders at Oak Ridge National Laboratory to explore how the Trump administration’s push for nuclear energy could drive U.S. energy independence and fuel the AI revolution. Get the facts first on Morning Wire. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As part of their efforts to increase domestic energy production, the Trump administration is pushing for a nuclear renaissance that will power AI and other technologies. In this episode, we visit a nuclear laboratory with the U.S. Energy Secretary, lawmakers, and the co-founder of OpenA.I. I'm Georgia Howe with Daily Wire executive editor John Bickley. It's Sunday, May 18th, and this is a weekend edition of Morning Wire. Here to discuss the Trump administration's nuclear renaissance is a Sunday, Daily Wire Senior Editor, Cabot Phillips. So, Cabot, you recently joined the Energy Secretary and others at a historic nuclear laboratory. We're going to get to that visit. But first, big picture, what are the president's plans for nuclear energy? Yeah, for decades now, we've heard lawmakers say that nuclear energy is the future, but for decades, it's been just that, the future.

But if the Trump administration has their way, nuclear energy will very much be in the present. The president's made clear that he views it as crucial for making America energy independent. and importantly powering the AI revolution, which will require far more energy than we currently have access to as a country. And in his first 100 days or so in office, President Trump has already taken significant steps to revamp this industry.

To learn more about those efforts, I spent the day with Energy Secretary Chris Wright at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in East Tennessee. Now, most folks are probably familiar with Oak Ridge because of its role in the Manhattan Project back in World War II, but today it is a massive research facility leading the way on American nuclear development.

have a listen to what Secretary Wright had to say there about the Trump administration's efforts. Oak Ridge, Tennessee, the site of uranium enrichment for the Manhattan Project. And now, over 80 years later, it's the site of a new technological leap, one that could decide America's position in the world. The enemy is China. Their weapon, digital warfare. To counter this threat, President Trump's Energy Secretary Christopher Christopher, right, and Open AI co-founder Greg Brockman have gathered America's brightest scientific minds together to accelerate scientific innovation using Oak Ridge's supercomputer, Frontier. So with China's threat growing, I've been sent here to ask what's at stake if America loses the digital arms race.

Standing outside the Thousand Scientist AI Jam, I spoke with Open AI co-founder Greg Brockman about why this gathering is significant. All right, tell us about the scientists AI Jam, the Thousand Scientists this is such an exciting day for us and I think for Oak Ridge and the scientists at the national labs because we're bringing together our AI with the work that they are doing. And so a thousand scientists are exploring how to use artificial intelligence to accelerate their work. And I've been talking to a number of them, some people who are using it to advance nuclear fusion research to come up with novel designs that would normally take weeks to do that they can do very fast, talking to people using it for biology and various other

kinds of research. We heard the Energy Secretary talk about this new Manhattan project. The Manhattan Project, critical to winning World War II. How nuclear energy is going to power the work that you're doing at Open AI and the work that others are doing in the space as well. Today we're leading the next generation of computing and artificial intelligence. Why nuclear? Why is it important for your space? Well, historically, I think over the past couple of years, the U.S. energy grid has not grown very much. That is something that President Trump and Secretary Wright, they are actually very enthusiastic about increasing the supply of, of energy because it is necessary for such energy-intensive manufacturing process is what we do.

The thing that you should think of AI is doing is manufacturing energy into intelligence. And one of the things about AI is that it not only is something that consumes energy, but it actually can unlock more energy. It can increase efficiencies. President Trump has been talking about the need to unleash AI. What do you make of his stance on AI in the future of the technology? Well, I think President Trump is very forward-looking on what is necessary in order for America to continue to lead on this technology. It's very clear at this point that AI is something that can benefit everyone. I think it's going to be the most important economic driver of the future. And so in order to make the most of that opportunity, which we have such an amazing opportunity

because America has been the leader in AI, we are the leader in it now. And I think that through public-private partnership, for example, the event that we're at today, where the national labs are using this technology to accelerate. And so I think that there is just so much energy and willpower from the President Trump, from the secretary, and from others in order to have America lead on this technology. On China, why is it so important that the U.S. is leading the way ahead of China in what folks are calling arms race? Well, artificial intelligence is going to improve everyone's lives to help people do more of what they want to do. And that is such a fundamentally American thing, right, that being an innovator leading the way, the reason that we, that it's so

important for us to invest in this is because it's going to help increase our economy and help it be so that we can continue to be a leader on the world stage. And according to Energy Secretary Chris right, the stakes couldn't be higher. You've used this phrase, the new Manhattan Project. What does that mean and what are the stakes? In the Manhattan Project, it was critical that we developed an atomic bomb before Nazi Germany did. Think of the world today if they had led and had an atomic bomb before we did.

The world would be unrecognizable. AI's been around for a long time, but it's hitting critical mass now. In the next few years, AI is going to change our world, not just economically, but in science and also in national defense. China is working aggressively at AI. If they got a meaningful lead on us in AI, it will be a different world in the future. We have to lead and win the AI race, just like we did Manhattan Project. This is Manhattan Project 2. I also spoke with Tennessee Senator Bill Hagerty, who talked about his frustrations with the Biden administration's handling of nuclear energy. The last four years, do you feel like we did a good enough

job of keeping abreast of our competitors? And what will the Trump administration do differently compared to the Biden administration. You know, the last four years seem to be consumed with theology regarding the environment. We're more interested in helping other countries than we were our own. So we're here today with the Energy Secretary with my good friend, Congressman Chuck Fleischman, to see what we can do to make certain that America remains at the cutting edge and that we're doing everything we can here in Tennessee to make that so. And finally, I asked Tennessee Representative Chuck Fleischman about what message our new Manhattan Project sense.

This new Manhattan Project, what sort of message do you think that sends to China? America's back, which is great. Under the first Trump administration, when I would visit foreign leaders, they would thank me to a person. Thank you, America, for leading. Not only in energy, but in foreign policy, our friends knew they were our friends. They could count on us. Our foes knew that they could fear us because they would not take actions against American

interest or against our allies. So the message to China, the message to Russia, the message to our foes and to our friends, is America is back in every sector. I'm going to worry about the energy sector. We have also great partners like Bill Hagerty, who you just heard from in the United States Senate, working hard every day so that America not only dominates,

but that America wins. Well, Cabot, thank you so much for going on location and doing those interviews for us. It was not exactly a burden. It was a lot of fun. Very cool stuff. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. We'll be back tomorrow morning with more news you need to know.