They are not mutually exclusive. Privacy is one of the most political issues out there because every fascist/billionare wants control and control requires surveillance. I have not completely given up on Proton because of one man’s statements, but it’s not looking good.
Those statements from the CEO suggest one of two things - naiveté (to think either US party cares about the “little guy” or about privacy and freedom) or cowardice (just sucking up to Trump like every other CEO right now). Neither of which is good for privacy or freedom because to achieve either, you need both awareness and a spine to stand up against this shit.
And the fact that no one else from the company or their board or foundation has bothered to jump in and take action means either they’re on board with his statements or too powerless, which again, doesn’t spell good things.
You want to run it on the phone itself? I don’t think any phone would be good enough for that. The issue with AI assistants is not just privacy. It’s also the resource consumption (and of course stolen content). It’s so high and only these big companies with huge server farms can do it.
If you just want a voice assistant for simple commands, I’ve heard of an open source local assistant called Dicio. But I don’t think you can talk to it like ChatGPT or something.