The White House recently unveiled its artificial intelligence (AI) action plan identifying more than 90 recommended changes in federal policy that the administration will pursue in the coming weeks and months. The plan is built on three pillars: accelerating innovation, building AI infrastructure, and leading in international diplomacy and security.

The administration emphasized its commitment to the responsible development and deployment of augmented intelligence – often called artificial intelligence – to improve health outcomes.

Key elements of the administration’s plan, include commitments to:

• Build public and professional trust through transparent, ethical oversight.
• Accelerate national standards for safety, performance, and interoperability – with strong physician representation.
• Create a coordinated federal regulatory approach to close gaps and reduce duplication.
• Invest in workforce education and upskilling to support safe adoption.
• Promote “secure-by-design” AI systems to protect health infrastructure.

The American Medical Association (AMA) is urging the Trump administration to devote more attention to several key areas, including:

• Ensuring meaningful physician leadership in shaping AI policy, regulation and implementation.
• Strengthening patient privacy protections – especially in open-data and open-source environments.
• Establishing clear liability frameworks to address physician concerns and appropriately assign accountability for AI errors and performance issues.
• Addressing equity and bias to prevent patient harm and avoid worsening health disparities.
• Adopting a whole-of-government approach, including states, to ensure balanced and consistent regulatory oversight.

The California Medical Association (CMA) is committed to ensuring that AI enhances, rather than undermines, the practice of medicine and the patient-physician relationship, and recently a CMA-sponsored landmark bill to ensure human oversight and patient safety are core components for the use of AI in health care settings was signed into law by Governor Gavin Newsom. As AI-enabled tools become more common in both clinical care and administrative functions, it is critical that they are designed, developed and deployed in ways that are ethical, equitable, transparent and evidence-based.

CMA has also raised concerns that AI – whether in the form of diagnostic algorithms, health plan decision-making tools, or patient-facing chatbots – must not interfere with physician medical judgment or limit patient access to care. Strong policy safeguards are essential to ensure that these technologies support, not replace, clinical expertise, and that their use is clearly communicated to both physicians and patients.

CMA will be closely tracking how the administration’s AI policy agenda unfolds and will continue to advocate for strong safeguards that protect patients, uphold physician judgment and advance equitable care.