By Maxwell Zeff
Publication Date: 2026-05-22 00:04:00
Three months ago, OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman expressed to me his concerns about a growing PR crisis facing artificial intelligence companies: Despite the popularity of tools like ChatGPT, an increasing portion of the population said they view AI negatively. Since then, the backlash has only intensified.
Freshmen are now being booed for speaking optimistically about AI. Last month, someone threw a Molotov cocktail at OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s San Francisco home and wrote a manifesto advocating crimes against AI leaders. No one has more to lose from this reputation crisis than OpenAI.
The person tasked with fixing the problem is Chris Lehane, OpenAI’s head of global affairs and a veteran political activist. I sat down with him this week to discuss what I think are his two biggest challenges so far: convincing the world to adopt OpenAI’s technology, while convincing lawmakers to enact regulations that don’t…
