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Dear Friends:
In September, we hosted our fourth annual flagship summit, Freedom Tech DC, convening a sold-out audience of roughly 250 policymakers, technologists, and business leaders in Washington. The two-day program featured multiple U.S. senators and House members, senior officials from the White House, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Department of War, and fireside conversations with Jack Dorsey and Michael Saylor. The summit was a clear demonstration of how timely and salient the policy conversation around open-source money and intelligence has become, with BPI at its center.
Other highlights from the quarter:
- State Department Partnership: In July, the U.S. Department of State named BPI a founding partner of its new Freedom Tech Excellence Program. BPI Director of Special Projects Matt Burtell was subsequently accepted into the program’s inaugural cohort.
- Congressional Testimony: In September, Head of Research Sam Lyman testified before the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on South and Central Asia, discussing his findings on covert foreign influence operations targeting the American debate over data centers and AI infrastructure.
- Presidential Endorsement of Data Center Dividends: Also in September, BPI published Data Center Dividends, a policy proposal under which counties would share surplus data center tax revenue directly with local households. Within weeks, President Trump endorsed the concept of data center dividends for local residents on multiple occasions.
- Leadership Transition: Conner Brown was named Executive Director of BPI in August, while Grant McCarty accepted a full scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School as a Levy Scholar and continues with BPI as Senior Advisor.
What follows is a closer look at our work this quarter, from policy and education to research, communications, and events.
With gratitude,
David Zell
President
dz@btcpolicy.org
Conner Brown
Executive Director
cb@btcpolicy.org
