OpenAI has proposed giving the U.S. government a roughly 5% equity stake in the company — worth about $42.6 billion at its recent $852 billion valuation — in a pitch delivered by Chief Executive Sam Altman to President Trump and senior officials.

The proposal, described by people familiar with the discussions, would structure the holding through a sovereign-fund-style vehicle intended to let the public share in the wealth generated by artificial intelligence. It arrives as OpenAI moves toward a potential public offering and navigates a lawsuit from Apple and mounting regulatory scrutiny.

Altman framed the arrangement as a mechanism to align the company's commercial success with broad national interest, according to the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The idea has not been finalized, and it remains unclear whether the administration will pursue it or what form any stake might take.

The overture reflects a broader shift in how frontier AI labs engage with Washington. As models grow more capable and more consequential, companies are seeking federal backing, clearer rules and access to public compute, even as lawmakers weigh antitrust and safety questions.

Any government ownership would be unprecedented for a leading AI laboratory and could raise conflict-of-interest and governance concerns. Critics are likely to question whether public capital should underwrite a single private company, while supporters may argue it democratizes the gains from a technology shaped by public research.

For now the proposal is a conversation, not a commitment. But its mere existence signals how intensely the world's most valuable AI ventures are courting the state as they scale, and how the line between Silicon Valley and Washington continues to blur.

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