Trump unveils new investments in energy and tech at Pennsylvania summit
Trump traveled to Pittsburgh at a summit helmed by Republican Sen. David McCormick that included dozens of top executives from companies aiming to make the city and the state a hot spot for advancements in robotics, artificial intelligence and energy.
McCormick announced more than $90 billion of investments in the state — spurring tens of thousands of jobs — although some of the projects had already been in progress ahead of the summit.
'I think we have a true golden age for America. And we've been showing it, and it truly is the hottest country anywhere in the world,' Trump said at the Pennsylvania Energy and Innovation Summit, held at Carnegie Mellon University.
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'I'm honored to be in Pennsylvania, and I'm honored to be in Pittsburgh. And you're going to see some real action here. So get ready.'
Trump has repeatedly pledged U.S. 'energy dominance' in the global market, and Pennsylvania — a swing state critical to his wins in 2016 and 2024 — is at the forefront of that agenda, in large part due to its coal and gas industry that the Republican administration has taken steps to bolster.
Both the president and senior administration officials on Tuesday framed the investments as part of a race against China for the most advanced deployment of artificial intelligence, with Trump saying, 'We are way ahead of China, I have to say.'
'China and other countries are racing to catch up to America on AI, and we're not going to let them do it,' Trump said during the hourlong roundtable held in a university gymnasium, speaking often from prepared notes. Flanked by several of his Cabinet members, company executives and local political leaders, Trump added that the U.S. will be 'fighting them in a very friendly fashion.'
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Before Trump spoke, his Cabinet members spoke of the need to produce as much energy as possible — especially from coal and natural gas — to beat China in the AI race for the sake of economic and national security.
'The AI revolution is upon us,' Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said during an earlier panel discussion. 'The Trump administration will not let us lose. We need to do clean, beautiful coal. We need to do natural gas, we need to embrace nuclear, we need to embrace it all because we have the power to do it and if we don't do it we're fools.'
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Some of the investments on a list released by McCormick's office were not necessarily brand-new, while others were. Some involve massive data center projects — such as a $15 billion project in central Pennsylvania — while others involve building power plants, expanding natural gas pipelines, upgrading power plants or improving electricity transmission networks.
Google said it would invest $25 billion on AI and data center infrastructure over the next two years in PJM's mid-Atlantic electricity grid, while investment firm Brookfield said it had signed contracts to provide more than $3 billion of power to Google's data centers from two hydroelectric dams on the Susquehanna River in Pennsylvania.
Frontier Group said it would transform the former Bruce Mansfield coal-fired power plant in western Pennsylvania into a new natural gas-fired plant, and AI cloud computing firm CoreWeave said it will spend more than $6 billion to equip a data center in south-central Pennsylvania.
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Blackstone plans to spend $25 billion on data centers and building new natural gas-fired power plants in northeastern Pennsylvania, and the company will start construction by the end of 2028, said Jon Gray, its CEO.
McCormick, a first-term Republican senator who organized the inaugural event, said the summit was meant to bring together top energy companies and AI leaders, global investors and labor behind Trump's energy policies and priorities.
The list of participating CEOs includes leaders from global behemoths like Blackstone, Bridgewater, SoftBank, Amazon Web Services, BlackRock and ExxonMobil and local companies such as the Pittsburgh-based Gecko Robotics, which deploys AI to bolster energy capacity.
'What's exciting about this event is it's a great catalyst for investments and closing deals in the region,' said Jake Loosararian, the founder and CEO of Gecko Robotics.
Administration officials at the summit included White House crypto czar David Sacks, Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Lutnick. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum also attended. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat, also spoke.
McCormick credited his wife, Dina Powell McCormick, with the idea for a summit. Powell McCormick served as Trump's deputy national security adviser in his first term and is a former Goldman Sachs executive who is now at BDT & MSD Partners, a merchant bank.
Pittsburgh is home to Carnegie Mellon University, a prestigious engineering school, plus a growing industry of small robotics firms and a so-called AI Avenue that's home to offices for Google and other AI firms. It also sits in the middle of the prolific Marcellus Shale natural gas reservoir.
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'What's going on is a rewiring of the economy, of the world over the next 15 years and that takes trillions and trillions and tens of trillions of dollars, and it starts with power,' said Bruce Flatt, CEO of Brookfield, during a panel discussion.
Pennsylvania has scored big investment wins in recent months, some driven by federal manufacturing policy and others by the ravenous need for electricity from the fast-growing AI business.
Nippon Steel just bought U.S. Steel for almost $15 billion, getting Trump's approval after pledging to invest billions alone in U.S. Steel's Pittsburgh-area plants.
Amazon will spend $20 billion on two data center complexes in Pennsylvania, while the one-time Homer City coal-fired power plant is being turned into the nation's largest gas-fired power plant to fuel a data center campus. Meanwhile, Constellation Energy is reopening the lone functional nuclear reactor on Three Mile Island under a long-term power supply agreement for Microsoft's data centers.
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Schiff and James come under fire from GOP Paxton's real estate dealings are in many ways distinct from those of James and Schiff, the Democrats targeted by the Trump administration. The investigation of James centers on forms she signed in 2023 while helping a niece buy a home in Virginia. One form stated that James intended to occupy the home as her 'principal residence.' But in other documents, the New York attorney general made clear she had no intention of living there. An email to the mortgage loan broker two weeks before she signed the documents stated the property 'WILL NOT be my primary residence.' 'As I've said from the beginning, if prosecutors want to know that truth about Attorney General James' mortgage applications, we are ready and waiting with the facts,' said Lowell, James' attorney. For over a decade, Schiff owned homes in Maryland and California, the state he represents, that were both designated as his primary residence. In 2020, then a congressman, Schiff designated his Maryland property as a second home — a step Paxton has not taken. Paxton has faced legal and political challenges Paxton's real estate dealings are not the first time he has drawn scrutiny for his conduct while in office. Before his election as attorney general, Paxton, then a state senator, admitted in 2014 to violating Texas securities law and paid a fine. He spent roughly 10 years under state indictment on securities charges while serving as attorney general. The charges were eventually dropped in 2024. Other alleged misdeeds in office led to his impeachment by Texas' GOP-controlled House in 2023. He was acquitted in a trial by the Senate. Angela Paxton did not cast a vote in his impeachment trial and recently filed for divorce, citing Ken Paxton's infidelity and other 'recent discoveries.' She did not elaborate. What ultimately unleashed the impeachment push was Paxton's relationship with Austin real estate developer Nate Paul, who pleaded guilty this year to one count of making a false statement to a financial institution. In 2020, eight top aides in Paxton's office told the FBI they were concerned the state's top law enforcement official was misusing his office to help Paul over the developer's unproven claims about an elaborate conspiracy to steal $200 million of his properties. The House impeachment managers accused Paxton of attempting to interfere in foreclosure lawsuits and issuing legal opinions to benefit Paul. They also alleged that Paul employed a woman with whom Paxton had an affair in exchange for legal help and that the developer paid for expensive renovations to the attorney general's home in Austin. That would be the same house that he declared in mortgage documents was his third primary residence.
