Trump administration backs OpenAI in copyright fight against New York Times

The Trump administration has taken OpenAI's side in a major copyright dispute, arguing that it should be legal for AI systems to learn from copyrighted text without permission or payment.

Federal arguments for AI training#

In a court filing submitted this week, the US Justice Department contended that restricting large language models from ingesting copyrighted material would damage innovation and the economy. Attorneys wrote that preventing this type of training would "severely hamper the Progress of Science and useful Arts" and harm American competitiveness.

The government rejected the New York Times' claim that OpenAI violated copyright law, framing the question instead as one of fair use—a legal doctrine that permits certain uses of protected work without the copyright holder's consent. The filing asserted that "constraining LLM development under a misunderstanding of fair use doctrine would thwart creative and scientific progress while hindering American prosperity and economic mobility."

The broader legal battle#

The Times filed the lawsuit in December 2023, claiming OpenAI trained its systems on countless articles without compensation and demanding billions in damages from both the company and Microsoft. The Trump administration's intervention through a "statement of interest" is a tool the Justice Department has employed frequently to influence private litigation aligned with its policy goals.

The Times case carries weight beyond one company: it could establish precedent affecting how media outlets, authors, and content creators fare against AI developers. Other publishers—the Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News, and Center for Investigative Reporting—have filed similar suits. Meanwhile, Anthropic settled a related case with authors in 2025 for $1.5 billion after a judge ruled it could legally train on books but remained liable for using pirated material.

Shifting dynamics in AI licensing#

At the same time, the relationship between media and AI labs has grown more nuanced. Major outlets including the Associated Press, Axel Springer, and Vox Media have signed licensing deals with OpenAI. Even the Times itself agreed in 2025 to license its content—including articles and recipes—to Amazon's generative AI tools, suggesting the company recognizes some commercial value in such arrangements while still objecting to unauthorized training.