Trump administration moves to underwrite US AI exports with billions in EXIM financing

This article was published on May 21, 2026 EXIM has more than $100bn of unused statutory lending capacity that the White House wants channelled into US-built, full-stack AI export packages, with the Commerce Department running a public solicitation for industry-led consortia. The Trump administration is moving to underwrite US-made AI exports with billions of dollars of federal export financing, the latest in a string of policy instruments that have shifted the US government’s AI strategy from one defined by export controls to one defined by export promotion. The vehicle is the Export-Import Bank of the United States, which has launched a dedicated Powers American AI Exports programme calibrated to channel statutory lending capacity into full-stack AI deals abroad. EXIM’s capacity for this is structurally large. The bank holds a $135bn statutory ceiling on outstanding loans and currently has roughly $34.1bn drawn, on the Institute for Progress’s running analysis. The unused headroom of more than $100bn is the capacity pool the White House is now positioning the AI Exports programme to consume. EXIM is also up for reauthorisation in 2026, with the proposed package potentially liftin