Social Conservatives Should Have Melania’s Back on AI
By Paul Steidler: Last week, First Lady Melania Trump again demonstrated that she is one of the most effective advocates for the responsible use of AI among children and that there are many reasons to be enthusiastic about its ability to improve children’s lives.
Because of her gracious, low-key, claim-no-personal-credit approach, many are overlooking her excellent work. Meanwhile, some, such as teachers’ union President Randi Weingarten of the American Federation of Teachers (AFT), are attacking the First Lady.
Melania Trump’s bona fides on AI are well established.
Last spring, the First Lady broke a legislative logjam on the Take it Down Act, a measure to require the removal of revenge porn and deepfake AI pornography, including child sex abuse, from the Internet.
Senator Ted Cruz, who sponsored and drove passage of the Take it Down Act, said upon its signing into law on May 19, 2025, “I am deeply grateful to my legislative partners, particularly Sen. Amy Klobuchar and First Lady Melania Trump, for their collaboration in advancing this critical legislation to protect every American’s privacy and dignity online.”
The Take it Down Act is the most important and significant AI-related legislation enacted in the current session of Congress.
In September 2025, the First Lady convened and chaired a meeting of the White House Task Force on AI Education, whose attendees included leaders of tech companies. The task force is securing major commitments for AI to be used in public schools through public-private partnerships and sharing information about best practices.
On March 24-25, the First Lady held a global summit at the White House with the spouses of 45 other world leaders to discuss and share information on the use of AI to personalize learning, the emergence of humanoid (robot) educators as at-home tools for students, and the importance of AI for economic growth. The most widely covered aspect of the event was the First Lady entering with a robot, who also addressed the audience.
AFT President Randi Weingarten was quick to pounce and distort the event, claiming the First Lady did not care about “teaching and learning,” and wants to entirely “replace human teachers with artificial intelligence-powered robots.”
Robots can supplement teachers’ work, especially at home and in tutoring environments. Furthermore, if the choice comes down to having an incompetent teacher or no teacher’s assistant at all, the robot is a better alternative. At one Arizona school, children’s fascination and fondness for a robot that assists teachers helped dramatically raise the school’s performance.
To entirely shun having AI-powered robots involved in children’s education is reckless.
The First Lady took Weingarten and other naysayers to task in an April 4 Fox News Op-Ed. “Clearly we should embrace AI now in order to ensure America’s children outpace the global community. The naysayers must stop wasting their time fearmongering about robots,” she said.
Importantly, she also said, “AI democratizes education and provides children in underserved communities equal access to the best caliber of academics … We are not protecting our children if America limits access to AI in education. In fact, we are putting our next generation at a global disadvantage.”
Today, teachers’ unions are pulling out all the stops to limit and control how AI is deployed in public schools, if they agree to deploy it at all. They are gaining ground in part because many social conservatives are sitting on the sidelines about these issues, while also raising undue fears about AI. This includes those in a January 29, 2025 public letter signed by 28 conservative activists and intellectuals.
AI, like any technology, requires responsible guardrails, and the First Lady has been instrumental in codifying them. For the sake of our children and grandchildren, we should heed her advice and boldly embrace AI to make this a better world.