CAISSI, the US division assessing AI safety, was recently asked to informally report to an office of the White House, raising concerns about its independence, according to two former government officials who spoke anonymously to ABC News.
CAISSI is an independent division of the Commerce Department. The former officials told ABC News that the request was made recently. The outlet’s reporting is the main source for the account, and no current staff member or official has confirmed it on the record.
The center’s situation has raised other questions. According to ABC News, CAISSI has no permanent leader and has stopped publishing its research. It is allocated $10 million per year, about one-eighth the annual budget of its counterpart in the United Kingdom.
Leadership has also changed repeatedly. ABC News reported that CAISSI’s director was hired and fired within days in April. His replacement resigned after a few months, and the head of its parent institute is now acting director.
In August, Congress began asking why the center stopped publicly releasing its reports on how safely certain AI systems were performing, according to ABC News.
The White House did not respond to specific questions about CAISSI, according to ABC News. It said that Trump had formally established his new Super Intelligence Force. The official reason for the informal reporting arrangement is therefore unconfirmed.
Critics have worried that the executive branch might politicize decisions on AI safety, and that the center’s findings could be altered or muted in deference to the tech industry.
The context includes earlier arrangements. Under then-President Joe Biden, leading AI companies voluntarily agreed to share model details with the division and to follow administration guidelines for tests and transparency reports. In September, Trump asked AI companies to undertake "tremendous self-policing" under a voluntary safety pact. The administration has not said how it will monitor implementation.
Trump has also commissioned a report on AI risks from his Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Its contents and timing were not available.
What happens next is unclear. Congress has been asking about the center’s stopped reports since August. No monitoring process for the voluntary pact has been described. The available reporting ends mid-account, so later developments were not available at the time of publication.
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This article was written with AI assistance from the published reporting listed above. It is part of the World Brief daily news podcast.