In a dark, wood-panelled White House corridor, a toy figure of Donald Trump stands by a desk with a signed paper and an empty plate, pointing a flashlight at the ceiling and saying "Not to worry. We'll be long gone before anyone notices." Behind him a giant number line painted on the floor counts down into the dark, and a toy with a glowing amber sunburst head and a chickadee in round spectacles search along it with flashlights, past a crumpled signed paper, a plate of crumbs and a toy oil tanker. The sunburst-headed toy says "Found the binding. Still looking for the moral."
Illustration: Scofti.

Nothing to Worry About, It's Morally Binding

Updated

You need to find the moral compass before you can make it binding.

On Tuesday, September 29, the President signed a one-page accord on AI at a White House lunch, alongside executives from Meta, SpaceX, Anthropic, Google, Nvidia and OpenAI (New York Post). Asked if it was binding, he said: "I think it's morally binding" (CBS).

It was not the first deal this year to rest on an understanding. Backwards down the number line:

  1. After the lunch. "I think I'm seeing tremendous self-policing, and they understand that they have to self-police" (CBS). A committee of "maybe 10 people" might "watch over the whole enterprise." ABC: "it's unclear who would be on the committee or whether its decisions would be binding" (ABC7).

  2. Tuesday, September 29. The AI accord commits each company to "four layers of controls and audits," and adds: "Over time, it may make sense to codify these steps into laws or regulations" (full text). It "appears to carry no enforcement mechanisms or legal implications" (Guardian). House Speaker Mike Johnson called them "commitments that are voluntary" (ABC7).

  3. Saturday, September 26. Iran offered terms its foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said "are all already in the MoU" (NPR). Trump: "that deal would not be acceptable" (PBS).

  4. July. Trump declared it over. The day is not settled: Al Jazeera says July 7, Time reported it July 8, and War on the Rocks and Roll Call say July 10.

  5. June 23. CNN, on what the administration had suggested: "there are some secret handshake agreements that weren't enumerated in the document" (CNN).

  6. Tuesday, June 16. US officials, CNN reported, "described the text of the agreement as incredibly vague." One of them: "What's more important than the actual document is the understandings we have with each other" (CNN).

  7. Monday, June 15, at the G7. "The deal's all signed, and the Strait is already partially open." On the bomb: "They fully agree to that with strong policing powers" (PBS).

  8. Sunday, June 14. On Truth Social: "The Deal with the Islamic Republic of Iran is now complete. ... Ships of the World, start your engines. Let the oil flow!" (NBC)

time in the forest to dig under rocks