Most States Are Regulating AI Despite President Trump's Opposition to State-Level Laws
Over 40 U.S. states are actively pursuing AI legislation in 2025-2026, with more than 1,500 bills under consideration and over 100 laws already enacted across 40 states, covering areas from deepfakes and algorithmic discrimination to safety testing and watermarking. Key states include California (comprehensive AI safety and watermarking mandates), Colorado (high-risk AI system requirements), New York (strict protocols for large model makers), and Utah (refined AI policy acts). This proliferation of state-level regulation continues despite the Trump Administration's executive order discouraging state laws and threatening to withhold federal funds from states with 'onerous' AI regulations. The resulting patchwork creates significant compliance complexity for AI developers operating across multiple jurisdictions.
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Trump Signs Executive Order Requiring AI Testing Prior to Frontier Model Releases
Zvi Mowshowitz analyzes a new Executive Order signed by President Trump that mandates AI testing prior to frontier model releases. The commentary covers the policy's scope, implications for major AI labs, and how it fits into the broader regulatory landscape for frontier AI development. This represents a significant federal policy action directly affecting the deployment pipeline for advanced AI systems.
Andrew Ng commentary: Trump executive order on AI strikes reasonable balance but overregulation risk remains
Andrew Ng analyzes a new White House executive order on AI, characterizing it as a reasonable compromise between promoting AI development and addressing cybersecurity concerns. The order was partly motivated by Anthropic's Mythos system, which demonstrated automated vulnerability detection in code. Ng credits advisors David Sachs and Sriram Krishnan for keeping the order from being overly burdensome, while warning that legitimate cybersecurity risks now give lobbyists a stronger tool to push for excessive regulation. He argues that governments lacking technical judgment should err toward restraint rather than overregulation.
European Union Regulators Delay Some AI Act Provisions, Delete Others
The European Parliament and member states agreed to amend the EU AI Act, delaying high-risk AI system compliance deadlines from August 2026 to December 2027 and extending other deadlines for watermarking, sandbox environments, and AI-driven products. The amendments also simplify compliance burdens for smaller companies, adjust personal data usage rules, and carve out exemptions for industrial machinery already covered by product-safety law. One area was strengthened: a new ban on AI-generated sexually explicit images of children and non-consensual nude images. The changes await formal adoption and follow sustained lobbying from European industry and two influential competitiveness reports.
Anthropic Endorses California SB 53 AI Safety Disclosure Bill
Anthropic has announced its endorsement of California Senate Bill 53, which would require large frontier AI developers to publish safety frameworks, release transparency reports before deploying powerful models, report critical safety incidents within 15 days, and provide whistleblower protections. The bill, authored by Senator Scott Wiener and informed by the Joint California Policy Working Group, takes a disclosure-based approach rather than prescriptive technical mandates, drawing lessons from the failed SB 1047. Anthropic frames the bill as formalizing practices already followed by major labs including Google DeepMind, OpenAI, and Microsoft, while creating a level playing field that prevents competitive pressure from eroding voluntary safety programs. Anthropic notes the bill's compute-based threshold (10^26 FLOPS) is an acceptable starting point but calls for future refinement as AI capabilities advance.
OpenAI's letter to Governor Newsom on harmonized AI regulation
OpenAI sent a letter to California Governor Gavin Newsom urging the state to harmonize its AI regulations with national and emerging global standards. The letter positions California as a potential leader in aligning state-level AI policy with federal and international frameworks. This reflects OpenAI's ongoing effort to shape the regulatory environment in which it operates.
Insurance Companies Carve Out AI Risk Exceptions; GPT-Rosalind, Claude Design, and Agentic Retail Deployments Highlighted
Major insurers including Berkshire Hathaway units, Travelers Group, and Chubb are excluding or restricting AI-related liability coverage, signaling growing concern over hard-to-model AI-driven claims. OpenAI introduced GPT-Rosalind, a domain-specific LLM fine-tuned for life sciences workflows, while Anthropic launched Claude Design for visual asset generation targeting non-designers. Additional items cover an AI-run San Francisco retail store exposing agentic system limitations, Wall Street banks cutting junior roles via AI deployment, and Anthropic's continued engagement with the Trump administration despite prior Pentagon restrictions.
Anthropic Responds to White House AI Action Plan, Calls for Transparency Standards and Export Controls
Anthropic published a policy response to the White House's 'Winning the Race: America's AI Action Plan,' endorsing its focus on AI infrastructure, federal adoption, and safety research while urging additional steps on export controls and mandatory AI development transparency standards. The company highlighted alignment between the plan and its prior OSTP submissions, and noted its proactive activation of ASL-3 protections with Claude Opus 4 as evidence that safety and innovation are compatible. Anthropic called for a single national standard for frontier model transparency rather than a state-by-state patchwork, and encouraged continued investment in NIST's CAISI for evaluating frontier models on national security risks including CBRN capabilities.
OpenAI's Proposals for the U.S. AI Action Plan
OpenAI has submitted formal policy recommendations to the U.S. government as part of the AI Action Plan process, building on its previously published Economic Blueprint. The proposals are aimed at strengthening American AI leadership at a national level. This represents OpenAI's continued effort to shape federal AI policy and regulatory frameworks in its favor.