Musk and Zuckerberg echo Trump's push to rebrand AI as 'super intelligence' on earnings calls. Others do not

A month after President Donald Trump ordered that "super intelligence" replace the term artificial intelligence within executive branch departments and agencies, his leading tech allies, Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg , followed suit on earnings calls. Their fellow tech CEOs were less eager to do the same.

Trump's declaration took place on Sept. 29, while he was hosting an AI luncheon at the White House for industry leaders. At the time, he was working to ensure the growth of AI in the U.S. with limited regulations. The president this week announced on Truth Social that he's banning the use of the terms "AI" and "artificial intelligence" in "all relevant documents" and "everything else."

SpaceX and Tesla adhered to Trump's wishes on earnings calls last week after Musk, earlier in October, changed the name of his rocket company's AI division to SpaceXSI. Speaking on Tesla's call about his work on humanoid robots, Musk said, "Some of them look very impressive, but they're not really using any kind of advanced AI or SI."

Zuckerberg was equally compliant on Meta's earnings call on Oct. 21, emphasizing his company's "goal of delivering personal superintelligence to everyone." However, Meta was already using the term, having created a unit called Meta Superintelligence Labs last year.

While Musk and Zuckerberg have been perhaps the fiercest supporters of the Trump administration among tech's CEOs, they're by no means outliers. Leaders of all the tech giants have contributed to Trump's inauguration festivities or his plan for the White House ballroom , and some have been intentional about getting rid of diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, programs that the president opposed.

But, for now at least, they're holding out when it comes to eliminating the term AI.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy peppered his call with use of "AI" on Thursday , uttering the abbreviation well over a dozen times in his introductory remarks. A day earlier, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said one of the company's three points of focus is "designing AI to empower people." And Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai was seconds into his quarterly earnings commentary when he said the search giant's "AI investments are driving increased usage and overall user growth."

Trump's attempted rebrand comes just ahead of the midterm elections next week, with the Republican Party in jeopardy of losing control of both the House and Senate. Trump's job approval has been dropping and his economic approval rating just hit an all-time low, according to the latest CNBC All-America Economic Survey released last week.