US Department of Justice files statement of interest backing fair use for AI training in NYT v OpenAI/Microsoft

What happened: On 2026-09-01 the US Department of Justice filed a 20-page statement of interest in The New York Times Co. v. Microsoft Corp. et al. (S.D.N.Y., No. 1:23-cv-11195), urging the court to hold that training large language models on copyrighted works is fair use. Signed by Associate Attorney General Stanley E. Woodward Jr., AAG Brett Shumate, and senior counsel Michael Weisbuch, the filing argues that 'constraining LLM development under a misunderstanding of fair use doctrine would thwart creative and scientific progress while hindering American prosperity and economic mobility.' It is the first time the federal government has formally weighed in on the wave of AI copyright cases. The statement is non-binding.

Why it matters to creators: The DOJ has now put the executive branch's weight behind the AI companies' fair-use defense in the flagship news-publisher case. If courts adopt this reading, journalists, authors and other text creators will have to rely on Congress to create any compensation framework, rather than on litigation — the brief explicitly argues licensing regimes should come from legislation, not court rulings.

Not yet known: Whether Judge Sidney Stein finds the statement persuasive; summary judgment in the case is not expected until 2027. The filing does not address whether pirated source material changes the analysis.