Doug Burgum Warns Whoever Wins AI Race ‘Controls The World’
Doug Burgum, the soft-spoken Interior Secretary overseeing more than 507 million acres of federally owned land, is haunted by a fear that seems, at first glance, outside his mandate. He worries the free world risks losing dominance in artificial intelligence — and with it, the future.
May 27, 2025
“When President Trump declared a national emergency on his first day in office, it was largely because of concerns over the electrical grid,” Burgum explained. “Making sure we have enough power to win the AI arms race with China is absolutely critical.”
This White House mantra, “It’s called drill, baby, drill,” encapsulates the immediate goal Burgum pushes at every campaign: driving down the average price of gasoline, while obsessing over the longer-term mission — AI dominance. As a former North Dakota governor and tech entrepreneur who sold his software to Microsoft, Burgum knows the stakes.
Electricity, powered largely by fossil fuels like natural gas and coal, fuels the data centers at the core of AI’s future. Burgum described data centers as literally manufacturing intelligence — where the best programmers and brightest minds “clone themselves” by training AI models to execute tasks indefinitely.
No longer science fiction, AI models like ChatGPT and X’s Grok are everywhere, with the U.S. as the undisputed leader — at least for now.
American tech firms enjoy a clear edge beyond just powerful AI models; they also control the best chips, funding, and talent. Former President Biden banned the export of advanced semiconductors to China, but unknown startups like DeepSeek are quietly challenging Silicon Valley’s supremacy with less sophisticated but still competitive AI chips.
This AI race has rattled markets and geopolitics, ushering in a new era of AI nationalism — where nations compete to develop their own technology or risk falling behind. Russian President Vladimir Putin famously said in 2017, “The one who becomes leader in this sphere will be ruler of the world.”
Burgum agrees — but he stresses the West must act fast.
“Trust me, you do not want to be getting your data from a Chinese data center. Whoever controls intelligence manufacturing controls the world. The next five years will determine the next 50.”
This urgency underpins White House policy, including Vice President JD Vance’s warning that the U.S. must compete “on the battlefield of the future” with digital equivalents of muskets.
Yet, Democrats on Capitol Hill are less optimistic. Maine Rep. Marie Pingree criticized Burgum for destabilizing his department and slashing Biden-era clean energy credits.
“In just four months, the department has been destabilized, and there’s been a stunning decline in its ability to meet its mission,” Pingree said. “This disregards climate change concerns.”
Burgum counters that the administration’s focus is clear: counter existential threats from Iran and China’s AI ambitions, and solve climate issues on its own timeline.
Energy production is key. Burgum reports industry leaders warn electricity demand will soon outpace supply — with requirements measured not in megawatts but in gigawatts. The power for one data center alone could equal Denver’s entire electricity consumption times ten.
“The demand for this product is like nothing we’ve ever seen in our lives,” Burgum stated.
The Interior Secretary concluded: “We’re going to sell energy to our friends and allies and have enough power at home to win the AI arms race. And this requires electricity.”
On this, Burgum and Trump are aligned. During the campaign, Trump famously dubbed artificial intelligence “the oil of the future.”