Sam Altman has spent years cultivating financial ties with Gulf monarchies that alarmed American national security officials, pursuing a vision in which the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia would provide tens of billions of dollars for massive AI infrastructure - some of it built on their soil. The plan, eventually known as Stargate, targets a data-center campus in Abu Dhabi seven times larger than Central Park, consuming roughly as much electrical power as Miami.

Altman first met Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman in 2016, and by 2018 was weighing whether to accept "tens of billions from the Saudi PIF," according to a former policy adviser's notes, "Hvylya" reports, citing a New Yorker investigation. After the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi - reportedly ordered by bin Salman - Altman joined the advisory board of Neom, the Saudi "city of the future," but resigned under pressure. Behind the scenes, however, he continued asking advisers whether he could still get Saudi money. "The question was not 'Is this a bad thing or not?' " a policy consultant recalled. "But, just, 'What would the consequences be if we did it?' "

The UAE proved more receptive. Altman visited Abu Dhabi in June 2023, describing a future with the Middle East in a "central role." He developed a close relationship with Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed al-Nahyan, the country's spymaster who controls $1.5 trillion in sovereign wealth. Altman visited Tahnoon on his $250 million superyacht and later called him a "dear personal friend" on X. When asked about gifts from Tahnoon, Altman declined to specify, saying only that "he and other world leaders have given me gifts."

US intelligence agencies worried that advanced American microchips sent to the Emirates could reach Chinese engineers through Huawei-dependent telecommunications infrastructure. The Biden administration ultimately withheld approval for building advanced chips in the UAE. "We're not going to be building advanced chips in the U.A.E.," a Commerce Department leader told Altman directly. But four days before Trump's inauguration, Tahnoon paid half a billion dollars to the Trump family's cryptocurrency company - and days later Altman stood in the White House Roosevelt Room to announce the Stargate joint venture.

"The truth of this is, we're building portals from which we're genuinely summoning aliens," a former OpenAI executive told The New Yorker. "The portals currently exist in the United States and China, and Sam has added one in the Middle East. I think it's just, like, wildly important to get how scary that should be."

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