Assessing the State of AI Adoption Across the Federal Government

In this in-depth evaluation, author Valerie Wirtschafter examines how artificial intelligence adoption across the U.S. federal government has accelerated under three consecutive administrations, with both the Biden and Trump administrations prioritizing AI as a tool for improving government efficiency, service delivery, national competitiveness, and national security. Drawing on federal AI inventories, policy memoranda, jobs data, and interviews with government technologists, the report finds that AI experimentation has expanded rapidly since 2023, particularly following renewed policy efforts under the Trump administration’s 2025 AI Action Plan.

Despite this growth, the report argues that AI adoption remains uneven and concentrated within a small number of large agencies. Challenges including limited technical workforce capacity, procurement and funding barriers, bureaucratic risk aversion, and low public trust continue to slow modernization efforts. At the same time, agencies are increasingly deploying AI for operational and mission-critical functions, including benefits administration, law enforcement, healthcare services, and administrative automation.

The analysis also highlights the dramatic rise in reported AI use cases across federal agencies, from roughly 700 use cases in 2023 to more than 3,600 by 2025 across 41 agencies. While the data remains imperfect due to inconsistent self-reporting and transparency limitations, Wirtschafter concludes that the federal government is moving steadily toward broader AI integration, while emphasizing that responsible adoption will require stronger AI literacy, procurement reform, transparency measures, and continued investment in technical talent and governance structures…