Firing of Top Copyright Official Raises Alarm Amid AI Debate

The Trump Administration fired U.S. Register of Copyrights Shira Perlmutter on Saturday (May 10), sparking concerns in the music business that the White House will take the side of technology companies in debates about AI and copyright.

The move came just two days after the dismissal of Perlmutter’s boss, Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden, and a day after the Copyright Office posted a report on the legal issues in training AI algorithms on copyrighted works. Although the White House has not given any reason for the move, it comes as the media business once again finds itself in conflict with Silicon Valley – this time as technology companies have far more influence in Washington. 

The Register of Copyrights reports to the Librarian of Congress, and speculation on the reason for Hayden’s May 8 firing varied. Hayden, appointed by President Obama, was the first African-American and woman to hold the position, leading some to view her dismissal as politically motivated. At a May 9 press conference, the White House suggested that “there were quite concerning things that she had done at the Library of Congress,” involving DEI and “putting inappropriate books in the library for children” — although the institution isn’t a lending library, let alone one that’s set up for young readers.

Perlmutter’s subsequent dismissal suggests that the Trump administration may be more concerned with copyright policy – and that Hayden’s firing was at least partly a step toward changing the leadership of the Copyright Office. The Copyright Office has the power to issue guidance on the state of copyright law and report to lawmakers on related legislation, and judges often use its interpretations in court decisions. Currently, the office is preparing a multi-part report, “Copyright and Artificial Intelligence,” the third part of which, about whether scanning works to train AI algorithms would qualify as infringement, was expected to come out this spring. Given the number of court cases involving this issue, as well as the potential damages faced by technology companies in them, the stakes are high.

Late on Friday (May 9), the Copyright Office posted online a “pre-publication version” of the report, which is not its usual practice. Although the issues are complicated, it interprets the law in a way that suggests such copying – especially for commercial purposes, involving generative AI products – would not qualify as fair use. The Copyright Office has no lawmaking power, but courts could be influenced by its analysis of case law.

The next day, according to several sources, Perlmutter received an email telling her she was terminated. 

There has been some speculation that Perlmutter’s dismissal was the result of the decision to post the report. However, several sources who had no direct knowledge of the situation, pointed out that Perlmutter might have known her dismissal was imminent, or at least possible, and had the report posted before that occurred. (Right now, no one knows, and neither the White House nor Perlmutter has commented.) And while the report is generally seen to favor rightsholders, it is an expert interpretation of existing law, not a set of policy recommendations.

Certainly, the issue of whether scanning works to train AI qualifies as fair use or copyright infringement has become a hot one. And since the early days of the second Trump administration, music and media lobbyists have worried about the influence of the technology business. In March, the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz responded to a request for public comments on the White House AI Action Plan by saying that “neither the Copyright Office nor any other government agency should release guidance related to this issue—or other issues critical to American competitiveness in AI—until the conclusion of the National AI Action Plan process.”

In late April, the right-wing American Accountability Foundation accused both Hayden and Perlmutter of being “deep-state liberals” and suggested that the Trump Administration “return an America First agenda to the nation’s intellectual property regulation.” Although both are Democrats, Perlmutter served in the first Trump Administration as the head of copyright policy in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, which is part of the Department of Commerce. Copyright has generally been one of the few non-partisan issues in Washington, since it usually unites Democrats who support the arts with Republicans who favor strong protections for property rights.

Perlmutter’s firing is likely to intensify the copyright debate, potentially creating a rift between Silicon Valley venture capitalists aligned with the Trump administration and Democrats, as well as some Republicans, who support copyright protections and believe in the independence of government agencies. Immediately after Perlmutter’s dismissal, Rep. Joe Morelle (NY-25) released a statement calling Trump’s termination of Perlmutter “a brazen, unprecedented power grab with no legal basis.”