OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, is trying to make it very clear that political contributions made by its leaders do not necessarily reflect the company’s views.
“Our employees are free to participate in the political process in their personal capacities, including by donating or providing advice to candidates, campaigns, and political organizations. When they do that, they speak for themselves and not OpenAI,” the company said in a statement Monday.
OpenAI also noted that it has not donated to any super PACs and does not have an employee-funded PAC.
The statement comes after political contributions made by OpenAI President and Co-founder Greg Brockman and his wife, Anna Brockman, started getting renewed attention last week.
On May 28, the nonprofit Build American AI said it supported an Illinois state bill that would put guardrails on AI, but criticized one provision requiring third-party audits of frontier models.
“We believe third-party audits of frontier models will be important, if implemented properly and professionally, but if not, they carry the risk of becoming politicized or ineffective due to being run through bureaucracies that don’t have sufficient AI expertise,” the nonprofit wrote in a post on X.
That same day, Brockman pushed back on claims that OpenAI was funding Leading the Future, the PAC affiliated with the nonprofit, saying the money came from him and his wife personally.
“In particular, there have been questions around Leading the Future (LTF), which has received support from our President and co-founder, Greg Brockman, and his wife Anna. As they’ve stated before, any engagement with that organization has been in a personal capacity, not on behalf of the company. OpenAI does not direct the activities of LTF, or have visibility into their operations,” OpenAI reiterated in its statement.
In 2025, Brockman and his wife each donated $12.5 million to Leading the Future, totaling $25 million, according to Federal Election Commission records. They also made identical contributions to MAGA Inc., giving another $25 million combined to the pro-Trump super PAC.
Leading the Future has also received contributions from venture capitalist and Trump ally Marc Andreessen, who has been calling for more pro-business and AI policies.
Brockman’s contributions dwarf the political donations made by other OpenAI leaders in 2025. Only a handful of OpenAI executives made political contributions last year, and most were just a few thousand dollars to campaigns supporting both Republican and Democratic candidates.
For instance, CEO Sam Altman’s largest contributions were $7,000 to the Mark Warner Victory Fund and $6,600 to the Democratic Party of Virginia. Chief Operating Officer Brad Lightcap donated $3,500 to LaHood for Congress, supporting Republican Rep. Darin LaHood of Illinois.
Altman has historically been a donor to Democrats, though he bent the knee shortly after Trump’s election in 2024 to donate $1 million to the Presidential inauguration fund. And OpenAI’s Chief Global Affairs Officer, Chris Lehane, was part of the early conversations around founding the Leading the Future PAC, according to the Wall Street Journal. It’s also worth noting just how difficult it has become to trace who donates to super PACs under current regulatory guidelines.
OpenAI and Leading the Future did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
The growing interest in who is funding whom comes as the fight over who gets to govern AI is just getting started, with companies, lawmakers, and the White House all trying to shape the rules.
On Tuesday, President Donald Trump signed a scaled-down version of an AI executive order that was abruptly scrapped last month.
The original order would have created a voluntary framework for AI companies to give the federal government access to frontier AI models up to 90 days before their wider release to “strengthen the cybersecurity of critical infrastructure,” according to a draft of the order sent to Gizmodo by a source with knowledge of the negotiations.
Politico reported at the time that the administration’s AI czar, David Sacks, raised industry concerns directly with Trump the night before the expected signing. Sacks reportedly argued that AI companies are already cooperating with the government, and that a federal review process could slow innovation and give China an edge in the AI race.
The new order shortens that review window to 30 days; however, it still keeps the section emphasizing that the framework is completely voluntary.
“Nothing in this section shall be construed to authorize the creation of a mandatory governmental licensing, preclearance, or permitting requirement for the development, publication, release, or distribution of new AI models, including frontier models,” the executive order reads.
Meanwhile, at the local level, AI companies like OpenAI and Anthropic are lobbying for their preferred state laws with a reported strategy to focus on building de facto federal legislation one state at a time.
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