A Conversation with Ben Buchanan on National Security and AI Policy

National security has become a dominant lens for AI policy in Washington. But what does that framing clarify, and what does it obscure? What role should frontier AI labs and academic researchers play in the American AI ecosystem? And when it comes to technological competition with China, is “race” even the right paradigm?

Ben Buchanan brings firsthand insight to these questions. From 2021 to 2025, he served as the White House Special Advisor for Artificial Intelligence, where he helped coordinate the Biden Administration’s major AI efforts. He also served as Director for Technology and National Security on the National Security Council. Now a professor at Johns Hopkins SAIS and author of The New Fire, The Hacker and the State, and The Cybersecurity Dilemma, Buchanan studies the intersection of AI, cybersecurity, and national security.

Buchanan will join the Berkman Klein Center’s Executive Director Alex Pascal for a conversation on how AI policy gets made and contested in Washington, the dynamics of U.S.-China AI competition, and what comes next as the current administration continues to chart its course.

Lunch will be provided. Please RSVP here.