Statement from Code for America CEO Amanda Renteria: Democracy Must Deliver

Today is a new day in America. 

Across the country, Americans have made clear what they expect from their government: make life more affordable, expand economic opportunity, and deliver solutions to the challenges that shape their everyday lives.

This is about more than a political mandate. It is a call to rethink what government is for and what people should be able to expect from it.

For too long, we’ve talked about government modernization as a technology problem or an exercise in making outdated systems more efficient. But the opportunity before us is much bigger. 

It is to build a government for the future: one that starts by listening to people, focuses on the problems they need solved, delivers measurable results, and earns trust through its actions. 

Democracy is lived in everyday moments: when a family receives the benefits they've earned, when a worker can afford to build a future, when a community is protected from disaster, when people can navigate public systems without needless barriers. Civic tech has known this, seen this, for a long time. 

But now, as AI reshapes our economy and society, this responsibility becomes even more urgent.

People want a voice in how AI shapes their lives. They want technology that expands their opportunities, makes essential services more accessible, and gives them more control, not technology that makes decisions about them without their participation. This message was true in red and blue states all across the country. AI should work for people, not happen to them.

That’s why the White House and the new Congress should work together on a national model for using AI responsibly to solve the public problems that matter most. Not simply a strategy for adopting, regulating, or reigning in a new technology, but a framework for ensuring that innovation translates into real public value.

For many in the civic tech space, you’ve seen this before. For those just tuning in, this is about reimagining how government can improve delivery. A new model should be guided by these four principles: 

1. Keep people in control. People should know when AI is shaping a public decision, understand the basis for that decision, and have a real way to challenge it.
2. Build shared infrastructure. Federal agencies should develop secure components, data standards, procurement tools, and evaluation methods that state and local governments can reuse and adapt.
3. Bring expertise and experience together. Government should set the direction, and technologists, public servants and communities should help shape delivery.
4. Turn pilots into public value. Fund the work needed to make promising tools useful every day.

The good news is we don’t have to start from scratch. Across red and blue states, public leaders are already preparing and demonstrating what is possible.

Maryland’s Benefits One Application helps eligible residents apply for multiple benefits through a single, mobile-friendly experience, rather than navigating disconnected systems. California’s FireSat initiative uses AI and satellite technology to detect and track wildfires, helping identify threats earlier. Colorado and New Jersey are piloting tax-filing tools designed to help eligible residents access the tax credits they are owed. And Utah is using an AI-powered chatbot to help speed up prescription renewals and free up more time for doctors to care for patients.

These efforts are different in purpose and application, but they share an important idea: technology is most valuable when it solves a problem people actually have.

The past two years have laid important groundwork. The next two should be about turning that foundation into measurable progress people can experience. 

We have an opportunity to move beyond the debate over whether government should be bigger or smaller and focus on whether it can deliver on its promises.

That is the work of building the government of the future.

And ultimately, that is how democracy earns people’s trust: not simply by giving people a voice, but by showing them that their voice matters.