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As competition with China intensifies, Washington is turning to a cornerstone of American soft power and diplomacy to expand its global influence in artificial intelligence: the Peace Corps.
The White House on Friday announced the “Tech Corps” initiative within the Peace Corps aimed at promoting American AI abroad and helping partner nations adopt cutting-edge systems.
The Peace Corps is an independent U.S. government agency that sends American volunteers abroad to support local development projects, including in education, health, agriculture and economic growth.
The new Tech Corps will be structured similarly but will recruit, train, and deploy volunteers with tech skills, including engineers and graduates in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics to provide “last-mile” support for the implementation of American AI solutions abroad, particularly at the application layer.
A website for the Tech Corps has launched and is accepting applications, which it says will be accepted on a rolling basis.
In an announcement, the Peace Corps said that the AI solutions the new group implements would be put towards “real-world grassroots problems” in key sectors, including agriculture, education, health, and economic development.
Volunteers would be sent to countries participating in the American AI Exports Program, announced in July under a Trump administration executive order aimed at maintaining U.S. dominance in advanced technologies globally.
The executive order aligns with broader U.S. efforts to counter the influence of Chinese technologies globally, including in developing nations.
Chinese firms have gained traction in some developing nations by offering open-source or open-weight models that are inexpensive, highly customizable, and able to run on local infrastructure — including Qwen3 and Deepseek.
AI sovereignty
While a full list of countries taking part in the AI Exports Program remains unclear, India is expected to be among them, with the Commerce Department welcoming its participation last week.
That statement had come ahead of the inaugural India AI Impact Summit 2026 in New Delhi, where Michael Kratsios, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, first announced the Tech Corps.
India is also joining the U.S.-led Pax Silica initiative — a Trump administration effort aimed at securing the global supply chain for silicon-based technologies — alongside Japan, South Korea, Singapore, the Netherlands, Israel, the United Kingdom, Australia, Qatar and the UAE as core members.
At the summit, Kratsios argued that expanding access to U.S. AI technologies was central to closing the gap in global AI adoption between developed and developing economies. “Real AI sovereignty means owning and using best-in-class technology for the benefit of your people,” he said.
AI sovereignty — which was a major topic at the Indian AI conference — refers to a country’s ability to develop, control and govern artificial intelligence systems within its own legal, economic and strategic framework.
The summit saw a number of American tech companies announce major investments in India’s AI infrastructure, building on the billions announced last year, aligning with the goals of the Tech Corps.
“AI is the future, and as the undisputed world leader in AI technology, the United States, through the Tech Corps, will be at the forefront of delivering these benefits,” said Richard E. Swarttz, acting Peace Corps director.
Tech Corps volunteers will serve abroad for 12 to 27 months or participate in virtual service placements, with on-ground deployments expected to begin in fall 2026. As with the Peace Corps, volunteers will receive housing, healthcare, a living stipend, and service awards upon completion.
In addition to the Tech Corps, the White House also announced other initiatives during the India AI summit, including a National Champions Initiative to integrate leading foreign AI companies into customized American AI export stacks.
“We recognize that partners need the chance to build their native technology industries, and believe facilitating this will be a critical part of the exports program,” the White House said.
It also announced new initiatives to help partner countries “overcome financing obstacles as they import the American AI stack,” through other soft-power institutions such as the World Bank and the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation.
