State Department Bureau Orders Diplomats to Call AI “Super Intelligence”

A preference President Donald Trump voiced at the U.N. has become an instruction for U.S. diplomats. The State Department’s Bureau of International Organization Affairs told employees to replace “artificial intelligence” with “super intelligence” in its documents and positions, according to an email obtained by the Associated Press.

From speech to email

Speaking to the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday, Trump said “artificial” made the technology sound “fake.” He said U.S. government documents would use “super intelligence” from then on. That was a promise about government language; the bureau’s email supplied an instruction to employees who prepare it.

Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Michael Drager sent the email shortly after the speech. Titled “Change in Nomenclature AI to SI,” it told employees to change references in documents and positions. It also specified “SI” for remarks and press materials moving forward, giving staff a shorthand as well as a replacement name.

Following the president's remarks at the GA today, please change all references of ‘Artificial Intelligence’ to ‘Super Intelligence’ in our documents and positions. We will be using ‘SI’ in all remarks, positions and press elements moving forward.

Michael Drager, in an email to Bureau of International Organization Affairs employees

The term reaches a U.N. meeting

The bureau handles U.S. diplomatic missions to U.N. and other multilateral agencies. Its wording therefore matters beyond an internal style choice: it shapes how those diplomats describe AI in positions, remarks and press materials intended for an international audience.

The new term was already audible on Wednesday. U.S. representatives used “SI” at a U.N. Security Council meeting about AI, the Associated Press reported. That is a visible instance of the language in use, rather than just a proposed edit to future documents.

The reach of the order

Trump spoke in government-wide terms, but the documented instruction went to employees of one State Department bureau. As of Wednesday, it was unclear whether other State Department bureaus had followed suit or whether other federal agencies had received similar orders. The distinction is important: a president’s stated preference is not, by itself, evidence that every agency has changed its working language.

For now, the clearest measure of the shift is narrow but concrete: a written directive in the bureau responsible for multilateral diplomacy, followed by U.S. representatives saying “SI” at the Security Council. The next question is whether comparable instructions appear elsewhere in the department or across the federal government.