FOR INSIDERS: Trump White House holds back new AI models, spurring confusion

The Trump administration’s request for OpenAI to delay the release of its new models is sparking more confusion over White House AI policy and keeping private firms on their toes.

The government asked OpenAI and Anthropic to delay or suspend their newest models this month, just weeks after assuring technology firms they would not let regulations impede innovation.

The unprecedented reach into the operations and decisions of AI companies is confusing tech policy analysts on both sides of the aisle, who say the White House’s approach to AI is inconsistent and could hurt American innovation.

“I’m particularly struck by how this episode undermines the administration’s own successful, by my metrics, AI agenda. [President] Trump has, since his first day in office, advanced a clear AI regulatory philosophy,” Neil Chilson, the head of AI policy at the nonprofit Abundance Institute, told reporters in a virtual briefing last week. 

“Yet now, without any rules, transparency or meaningful process, the government has effectively cut off all access, including all access for Americans, to a leading U.S. model. China must be cheering,” said Chilson, the Federal Trade Commission’s former chief technologist. 

OpenAI announced last week it would preview its newest GPT-5.6 model series with a “small group of trusted partners” before a public rollout. 

The firm previewed the plans and capabilities of GPT-5.6’s Sol, Terra and Luna models with the government, and at the request of the Trump administration, won’t release them broadly for at least a few weeks amid cybersecurity concerns, the firm said. 

While OpenAI followed the Trump administration’s voluntary request, CEO Sam Altman said this is not a long-term or perfect solution to keeping AI’s capabilities under control. 

“I think it is quite reasonable to roll out models — especially as they reach significant new levels of capability — in this way. It fits with our long-held strategy of iterative deployment. But this isn’t quite the process that we think is optimal,” Altman wrote on the social platform X.

Clarifying he does not think a required preview period for red teaming — or testing cybersecurity effectiveness — is a “bad idea,” Altman said he doesn’t “like the idea of........

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