The government wants to rein in powerful AI, but there are downsides

The government is stepping up its push to rein in powerful AI models that it believes could endanger national security. On June 26, Representatives Josh Gottheimer, a New Jersey Democrat, and John Moolenaar, a Michigan Republican, introduced the bipartisan Cloud Security Act, which would have AI companies flag suspected “misuse” of their platforms to the government. The legislation, advocates say, would close a critical loophole in current export rules designed to prevent rival countries like China from acquiring advanced AI chips. (Fast Company has reached out to Gottheimer and Moolenaar for comment.) While there are already sharp limits in place on the sale of these chips, lawmakers want to empower tech companies to more freely report to the federal government suspicions that a foreign actor is using their products to create advanced AI models. The bipartisan bill comes as the Trump administration is moving forward with plans to limit public access to leading American AI models. In recent days, federal officials worked with OpenAI on a deal that would sharply restrict which customers are granted access to its upcoming ChatGPT 5.6 model. That move came just weeks after the Commerce Department pushed Anthropic to roll back its release of Fable 5, a version of its powerful Mythos model, citing security concerns. The move effectively prevents Anthropic from selling its most advanced product. The company has observed the order and pulled the model offline. There are real reasons, of course, to worry about the implications of making ever-more dextrous AI models publicly available, and the very real possibility that they will be used by bad actors. Still, there are also reasons to be concerned about the growing movement by the federal government to limit access to certain AI models. Even if these limitations do help protect national security in some ways, a blunt and sudden curtailment also runs the risk of leaving other organizations without technology that could help t