North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum, a Republican, says he will use artificial intelligence to make the federal government more efficient if elected president.
Burgum shared a preview on how he'd approach A.I. in a recent exclusive interview at Inc.'s offices, framing A.I. as a "co-pilot" that can help government workers improve their productivity, instead of a technology that will eliminate jobs.
He speaks from experience. North Dakota, Burgum said as an example, used AI when the budget cuts kept the state from hiring additional full-time employees. Earlier this year, the state government further partnered with cybersecurity technology vendor Palo Alto Networks to work on an autonomous software that would handle all of North Dakota's IT cyber protection and response duties, according to cyber security news outlet CSO Online.
"You didn't get every state employee you wanted to hire. But I got [you] a co-pilot," he says, referring to A.I. "This co-pilot speaks 26 languages. It can code. It works seven by 24. It doesn't need a desk, it doesn't need a computer. It doesn't need any state benefits. It's free."
A.I. is just one part of Burgum's plan, which he noted in a far-reaching conversation that ranged from the importance of antitrust policy to the problem of overregulation in the federal government. Burgum, a longtime entrepreneur, talked about the pivotal role being a founder and investor played in his life, so much so that it would inform his presidential style, he says.
"From that whole journey of being involved in creating dozens and dozens of startups over my life," he said. "The learning is innovation, not regulation."
Considered one of the wealthiest governors in America, Burgum led the accounting software company, Great Plains Software, until 2001 when it was acquired by Microsoft for more than $1 billion. After that, he was involved with several other startups, some of which also went public. These companies include early growth capital firm Arthur Ventures which he founded, and software company Atlassian, which he led as board chairman. These experiences helped win him two consecutive terms as North Dakota Governor since 2016, despite not having any prior political experience.
When asked about how he felt about small businesses, Burgum said he thinks the federal government has not given entrepreneurs the support they deserve, especially when big corporations hold outsize sway in Washington. To this end, if elected he would keep the U.S. Small Business Administration intact, but he would rethink how it serves its clients.
"What are we doing here to support these entrepreneurs? That's where job creation happens in our country," he says. "We've got to figure out a way to support them, and I think this is not just as much as the programs you do, but getting the red tape and the anti-competitive practices out of some of these industries."
To suggest that the SBA has been anti-competitive or that it hasn't been streamlining its processes would be inaccurate. In the last year, the SBA had done away with various practices like having to get paper loan approvals before agreeing to back a small business loan. And the agency has worked to add more certified lenders into its community.
Burgum says that he would adopt many of the efficient practices he has been able to implement as a two-term governor of North Dakota to the White House. By way of example, in 2022, Burgum formed a working group to weed out unnecessary and burdensome policies across agencies in the state, according to an executive order he signed involving eliminating red tape. The governor has since signed 50 bills that aimed to either streamline or modernize these policies for a more efficient government.
"I don't know any other governor alive who's ever cut 27 percent of their budget and kept the trains running on time," said Burgum. "We can keep making those kinds of moves if we keep applying the productivity that makes the jobs more meaningful and makes the services better delivered."
And he's not convinced the government is currently on track. The federal government spends more than $100 billion on information technology and cyber investments every year, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). But that doesn't mean the use of technology has led to greater efficiencies. In some cases, the use of technology has caused harm. In February this year, the Biden administration ordered federal agencies to "root out bias in the design and use of new technologies, such as artificial intelligence."
Burgum isn't swayed by those negative results. "It doesn't matter what segment of the economy you're in. If you're a small business owner, you're engaged with technology," he says. "Technology's changing every job, every company, every industry."
Still, he is in favor of limited federal intervention-particularly when it helps to level the playing field between big and small businesses. Case in point: the Federal Trade Commission's recent case against Amazon. "There are places where we need guardrails, and the FTC is looking into some of those right now. But I would support that because we've got to make sure that we are creating an opportunity for small businesses to be able to be competitive." This, he said, is how small businesses can win on their own merit, instead of losing because "big tech slanted the table against them."
Ultimately, smart regulation is about ensuring fairness and then just getting out of the way, Burgum says. "I'm not a regulation guy," he says. "But we have to have some guardrails."
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