Betting on America: Winning the Global Tech Race

Ryan Cook, co-founder and chief technology officer of Arc, joins Navin Girishankar on Betting on America to discuss America's maritime electrification opportunity. In this conversation, they discuss the potential recreational, commercial, and defense applications of electric boats. They also examine constraints to rebuilding America’s maritime capability, and lessons learned for reindustrialization, innovation, and supply chain resilience.

Laurie E. Locascio, Ph.D. NAE, president and CEO of the American National Standards Institute and former director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, joins Betting on America to make the case that sustaining U.S. standards leadership requires playing the long game. Standards-setting is how governments, industry, and experts agree on common rules, from defining a meter, to determining how a phone connects to Wi-Fi. Standards are increasingly central to the modern economy, and China and other countries are ratcheting up efforts to shape them. Locascio argues that the U.S. government should incentivize companies to pursue long-term standards goals and ensure that the best U.S. technical diplomats have seats at the tables where global standards are set.

Anne Neuberger, General Partner and Head of Global Affairs at a16z and former Deputy National Security Advisor for Cyber and Emerging Technology, joins Betting on America to make the case that technology leadership is security. She argues that sustaining leadership has become increasingly challenging as acceleration technologies like AI, robotics, quantum, and cyber converge, creating significant upsides for innovation but also downside risks. These technology disruptions will require policymakers, investors, and our alliances to adapt rapidly.

Join us for an episode of Betting on America, featuring a panel discussion on the AI revolution, reindustrialization, and new pathways to Black wealth. The panel was moderated by Joint Center President Dedrick Asante-Muhammad and featured Dr. Nicol Turner Lee of the Brookings Institution, Chanelle Hardy of Google, and Navin Girishankar of CSIS. The panel explored the risks and opportunities presented by AI and America’s reindustrialization, with a focus on how to ensure AI-driven growth becomes a pathway to greater opportunity and wealth creation for all.

Join us for a special episode of Betting on America, featuring the recent CSIS-hosted “International Call to Action for 6G Leadership and Security” with the U.S. Department of Commerce, a leader in advancing secure, trusted, and innovative wireless technologies. Deputy Secretary Paul Dabbar, German Ambassador to the United States Jens Hanefeld, and Assistant Secretary Arielle Roth kicked off the convening, bringing together representatives from 25 governments and industry leaders to explore why 6G will be critical for the AI race, critical infrastructure, and advanced manufacturing — and why the United States cannot build the ecosystem alone.

Former Director of the National Science Foundation Dr. Sethuraman Panchanathan joins Navin Girishankar to discuss how the United States can democratize discovery and unlock the "missing millions" of untapped scientific and engineering talent. Dr. Panchanathan reflects on his tenure leading NSF and why expanding opportunity is central to America's innovation advantage. He explains how AI can broaden access to education and research, why public-private "hyper-partnering" is reshaping scientific discovery, and how to balance openness with research security.

Bob Mumgaard, co-founder and CEO of Commonwealth Fusion Systems, joins Navin Girishankar to discuss whether fusion can usher in an era of virtually limitless clean energy—and whether the United States will lead the way. Bob explains the technology, key commercial milestones, the race with China, the path from experimental reactors to the electric grid, and why fusion could transform AI, manufacturing, and national power. He also discusses how to balance scientific openness with research security and how the United States can cultivate the talent needed to lead the next energy revolution.

Congresswoman Sydney Kamlager-Dove (D-CA) joins Navin Girishankar to discuss the opportunities and challenges presented by AI and the broader reindustrialization process. She explores how to ensure that historically underserved communities benefit from technological transformation and shares her views on the U.S. trade agenda, its implications for the Indo-Pacific, and the importance of strong export controls.

Marc Andreessen, Co-founder and General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, joins Betting on America to press past the settled question of whether AI is going to transform our world. They explore more substantive questions: who bears the cost, can our institutions absorb disruptions, and what government and the private sector must each do to ensure the gains are broad and the losses are survivable.

Tune in for a wide-ranging conversation on the economic, social, and geopolitical implications of the AI revolution with one of the nation's leading technologists and investors—now advising the President as a member of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST).

Co-founder and CEO of Form Energy, Mateo Jaramillo, joins Navin Girishankar to discuss the challenge of building long-duration energy storage from the ground up. He explores iron-air batteries as a scalable and bankable innovation, the precision manufacturing process required to bring this technology to market, and why West Virginia was the right place to build. He also reflects on the evolving role of government, the investor base backing the effort, and the lessons learned at the frontier of U.S. reindustrialization.

Join us for an episode of Betting on America, recorded at the CSIS Futures Summit. Navin Girishankar moderates the panel "U.S. Commercial Diplomacy Through the Lens of the Private Sector," joined by Cynthia Conner, Senior Manager for International Policy at Chevron; Nicole Issac, Vice President of Global Public Policy at Cisco; and Katherine F. Pickus, Chief Sustainability Officer at ADM. They discuss where U.S. commercial interests and countries’ development goals come together, the constraints U.S. companies face in emerging markets, what effective commercial diplomacy looks like, and why getting this right matters.

Congressman Ami Bera (D-CA) joins Navin Girishankar to discuss the importance of reviving economic alliances amid rising global threats. He explains the roots of today’s economic security challenges, as well as the dual goal of achieving balanced economic integration with countries like Japan, Korea, and India while rebuilding the U.S. domestic industrial base. He highlights his legislative efforts to strengthen critical minerals supply chain resilience through economic security pacts in the Global South. He also explores opportunities for AI in healthcare and emphasizes the need for all Americans to contribute to the nation’s economic security goals.

Under Secretary Darío Gil joins Navin Girishankar to discuss the Genesis Mission—a Department of Energy–led initiative to build an AI-driven platform for accelerating scientific discovery. Under Secretary Gil outlines the Mission's integration of AI, supercomputing and quantum technologies for scientific exploration, alongside institutional innovations such as public-private partnerships and interagency coordination. He also addresses research security, allied collaboration, and the long-term vision to revitalize the U.S. science and technology enterprise.

Senator David McCormick (R-PA) joins Navin Girishankar on Betting on America to discuss the urgency of economic renewal in the face of myriad challenges to national power. In this wide‑ranging conversation, Senator McCormick discusses the AI revolution, U.S. trade policy, defense tech innovation, and workforce issues. He reflects on Pennsylvania’s experience and its potential to offer lessons for the country as a whole.

Join us for a special episode of Betting on America, recorded live at the 42nd Annual National Association for Business Economics Policy Conference. Navin joins the panel, “Industrial Policy and Economic Security: Confronting the China Challenge,” alongside Oliver Melton, Director of Rhodium Group’s China practice; Laura Taylor-Kale, Senior Fellow for Geoeconomics and Defense at the Council on Foreign Relations; Randall G. Schriver, Chair of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission; and Tani Fukui, Senior Director of Global Economics and Market Strategy at MetLife Investment Management, to discuss what it will take to secure U.S. leadership in the long-term competition with China.

This event is made possible through support from the National Association for Business Economics.

Join us for a special episode of Betting on America from a recent live CSIS event featuring Senator Maria Cantwell (D-WA) and Senator Todd Young (R-NC), discussing what it will take to secure U.S. technology leadership in the long-term competition with China. The discussion highlights bipartisan priorities for strengthening critical supply chains, accelerating innovation, and building resilient ecosystems in an era of strategic rivalry.

The event also marked the launch of the Tech Edge Report—a flagship publication from CSIS’s Economic Security and Technology Department. The report introduces a new framework for assessing U.S. and Chinese technology ecosystems and kicks-off a multi-year research effort to inform and shape policy on the drivers of long-term advantage in the U.S.-China technology competition.

Jan Sramek, CEO of California Forever, joins Navin Girishankar on Betting on America to discuss how his company is reimagining the American city, how the U.S. can rediscover its ability to build, and why it is vital for U.S. economic security. In this conversation, they explore what it takes to build a city from scratch, and how government, business, and labor can work together to build the factories of the future.

Paul Ryan, former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, joins Navin Girishankar on Betting on America for a wide-ranging conversation on the big forces shaping politics and policy—competing populisms, U.S. trade policy and its discontents, out-of-control fiscal deficits, the future of the U.S. dollar, and the tech race with China. Speaker Ryan shares his thoughts not only on the challenges but also on potential solutions to set the United States on a forward path to shared prosperity.

David Beasley, former South Carolina governor and former executive director of the World Food Programme, joins Navin Girishankar on Betting on America to share lessons on U.S. global leadership for a new era of economic security. They discuss his experience leading the WFP and negotiating in conflict zones, along with his views on the role of the U.S. private sector in the Global South, addressing domestic inequality, and competing with China on values.

Join us for a special episode of Betting on America from a recent live CSIS event featuring Dr. Mark Calabria, Chief Statistician of the United States, alongside leading experts from government, industry, and the research community. The discussion examines what it will take to build a modern statistical system—one that is accurate, credible, and capable of supporting America’s economic security in a more competitive and fast-moving world.

Watch the full event here.