Trump administration to spend $50 million in AI research to fight childhood cancer

President Trump on Tuesday directed his administration to spend $50 million in artificial intelligence research to help fight childhood cancer.

Surrounding the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office with children who are fighting cancer, Mr. Trump signed an executive order to unlock the funds. The $50 million funding will be spread out over 10 years.

“You’re all going to get better very soon,” Mr. Trump told the children. “We’re going to defeat childhood cancer once and for all.”

The order directs the Make America Healthy Again Commission to work with the Office of Science and Technology Policy to mine information from the childhood cancer data initiative, which Mr. Trump established during his first term in 2019.

It will deploy artificial intelligence to improve clinical trials, sharpen diagnoses, fine-tune treatments, unlock cures and strengthen prevention strategies.

One of the ways researchers plan to use AI to fight childhood cancer is to build scalable models to predict how a child’s body responds to therapy to minimize side effects and predict how a child’s body will respond to treatment, said Michael Kratisos, director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

Mr. Trump said the move will “massively accelerate” pediatric cancer research and “harness the extraordinary potential” of artificial intelligence.

“We’re going to hook up the artificial intelligence with all of the other things that we have at hand, and we’re going … to get answers,” he said. “These young children — some are better, others are getting better — you’re all going to be getting better very soon.”

Some of the children spoke after Mr. Trump signed the order and thanked him for boosting childhood cancer research.

The announcement comes as Mr. Trump’s 2026 budget proposes cutting funding for the National Cancer Institute by 37%. However, his budget has not yet been finalized.

Roughly 400,000 children from infancy to age 19 are diagnosed with cancer worldwide each year, according to statistics from the World Health Organization.