Cretton will also serve as the White House’s top AI advisor, and AI policy has been upgraded to a national security issue

From Wall Street lawyer to SEC chairman to director of national intelligence, Clayton will now step into the field of artificial intelligence (AI). U.S. President Trump is expected to appoint him as the White House's top AI adviser, which will make him likely to hold important intelligence and AI policy positions at the same time. It also highlights that AI has been upgraded to a national security issue in the eyes of the Trump administration.

The Washington Post and other foreign media reported that Jay Clayton’s career background is quite diverse. He has worked at a Wall Street law firm for many years, representing Goldman Sachs during the 2008 financial crisis, and also represented Barclays in its acquisition of the assets of Lehman Brothers.

Please read on...

Thereafter, he served as chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), responsible for supervising the U.S. financial market from 2017 to 2020; in 2025, he served as the federal prosecutor for the Southern District of New York, handling financial crimes and national security cases. In July 2026, he was confirmed by the Senate as the Director of National Intelligence and was officially sworn in on August 3.

Creighton currently serves as the chief adviser to the president on intelligence affairs and oversees 18 intelligence agencies across the United States. If confirmed, he will continue to be at the helm of the intelligence system while also being responsible for the highest-level AI policy advisory to the Trump administration; this AI appointment does not require confirmation by the Senate.

This personnel arrangement also reflects the Trump administration’s change in AI policy thinking. Former White House AI czar and venture capitalist David Sacks advocated for AI to develop as quickly as possible, but since he left office in March, government officials have increasingly needed to deal with the security threats posed by the latest generation of AI models and the danger that AI agents may get out of control.

The Trump administration has recently been opposed to slowing down the development of AI and increasing regulation, but it has also begun to require industry players to take more responsibility for AI safety. The White House invited top executives from the AI ​​industry to lunch on September 29. Several major AI companies promised to develop new systems safely and accept external supervision. The next day, Federal Trade Commission officials said they had launched an investigation into Anthropic and OpenAI.

In an exclusive interview with CNBC the day after meeting with technology industry leaders at the White House, Clayton said that "superintelligence" (SI) is a national security issue. These remarks also show that national security will be an important consideration when he handles AI policy in the future.

In fact, Clayton is not just recently exposed to technology and national security issues. When he was chairman of the SEC, his supervisory work involved information security and technology risks in the financial system; after leaving office, he also testified before the House Select Committee on China on the threats posed by Beijing to U.S. financial stability.

Creighton is expected to serve as AI czar at a time when the Trump administration is also rethinking the direction of AI policy. As the role of AI in the eyes of the U.S. government gradually extends from technology and industrial policy to the field of national security, Creighton may also face new challenges different from those in the past.