Quarterly Update of the Deal of the Century Initiative: heading to DC
Over Q1 2026, we extensively engaged with top-level Vatican AI leaders and relevant US officials in light of a major planned roundtable in Rome for June 18-19.
The roundtable sought to contribute to turn JD Vance’s deferment to the Pope on AI safety and ethics, in May 2025, into a catalyst for other key potential humanist influencers of Trump's AI policy — to converge around the Vatican’s call for a treaty for safe and humane AI.
However — due to Thiel’s March 2026 lectures in Rome depicting anyone fostering a treaty to prevent ASI as an Antichrist, and a stark disagreement between Trump and Vance and the Pope on the war in Iran — the “Caesar-Popist fusion” that Thiel feared could arise between Vance and Pope Leo XIV has been successfully averted (or pre-empted).
As a consequence, we’ve revised our strategy to focus on other key potential influencers of Trump's AI policy — that can sway Trump towards a proper US-China-led AI treaty — including on Rubio, Bannon, Gabbard, DeSantis, the pro-human AI movement, the Human Movement, and some US AI lab leaders.
Accordingly, our June 18-19 closed/open-doors Rome roundtable (archive webpage) was merged with our closed-doors Washington. DC roundtable planned for September 2026, tentatively on the 15th-16th (draft gdoc event page).
As detailed in our updated Executive Summary, we also expanded our proposal beyond its core aim to promote a proper US-China-led AI treaty, to include a proposal to Trump to implement some sort of treaty-ratified citizen co-ownership scheme of leading AI labs. It would be framed as extensions of his US Sovereign Wealth Fund and Genesis Mission initiatives. It is inspired by co-ownership schemes called for by the Bernie-to-Bannon The Human Movement and by One Project, and in pursuit of goals called for by Altman, Musk, Amodei and top AI lab investors, fearful of social unrest.
Treaty-ratified co-ownership may be the most durable mechanism to enact a fair sharing of the immense power and wealth AI will generate — because it alone survives international competition, electoral reversal, and the pre-ASI consolidation pressures that would unwind any purely domestic scheme. It is inspired by co-ownership schemes called for by the Bernie-to-Bannon The Human Movement and by One Project, and in pursuit of goals called for by Altman, Musk, Amodei and top AI lab investors, fearful of social unrest.
The DC event will be shaped and co-hosted with DC-based partner think tanks — ranging from the pro-human AI movement to conservative think tanks. It will primarily target relevant staff, officials, or envoys of those key potential influencers, as well as suitable introducers and top domain experts.
It will act as a catalyst for joint advocacy activities, including: 1-to-1 meetings and introductions, a 400-word Appeal to President Trump (draft gdoc), a 2000-word Open Letter to President Trump (early draft); a version 3.0 of our 300+ page Strategic Memo for the Deal of the Century (webpage of v2.6) in the form of an edited volume, and other advocacy activities.
Here are ways you can participate and help:
Apply to participate as a speaker, partner, sponsor, or co-host of the September 2026 DC event, or recommend fitting prospects or make introductions. Participants will be asked to participate in finalizing and promoting the Appela and Open Letter to DJT and participate as contributors or (co)author of specific chapters of the 350-page Strategic Memo of The Deal of the Century v3.0 (following on v2.6)
Directly donate or introducer donors to help us raise the $400k we need to run until the end of 2027 at full capacity, moving to DC, and hiring one full-time DC staff — or donate even a much smaller amount to extend our runway (we operate via an April $20k bridge funding from Ian McInnis).
Sign our Open Call, leave a Testimonial, provide one-off strategic advice (on the drafts above and beyond) via email or Zoom. Apply to join our coalition, advisors board, or volunteer team.
