What execs and politicians are saying about slowing down AI development

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei published an essay arguing that development of frontier artificial intelligence should be paced, not halted, and outlined a three‑part approach to do so. His recommendations include embedding independent third‑party evaluators to verify safety practices and report incidents, coordinated standards and limits among frontier AI companies in democratic countries, and seeking international coordination with authoritarian governments where possible. Anthropic said it would move forward immediately on the first measure by adopting embedded third‑party evaluation.

The essay drew rapid endorsements from several prominent AI leaders. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman publicly agreed that the frontier should be paced, committed to deploying independent evaluators at OpenAI, and said the company supports a federal framework that sets consistent safety requirements for frontier systems. Altman emphasized that "pacing" does not mean stopping research entirely and warned of two major dangers he sees for AI: loss of control over the future to AI and excessive concentration of power.

Demis Hassabis, co‑founder and chair of Google DeepMind, said Amodei’s direction was correct though details remain to be worked out, pointing to a standards‑body framework he published in July. Elon Musk also expressed support by reposting Amodei’s essay. Those endorsements signal alignment among some industry leaders around the idea of stronger verification and shared safety standards.

Responses from elected officials were mixed. Former President Donald Trump criticized the proposal on Truth Social, arguing that strong executive leadership and existing powers are the right guardrails. Senator JD Vance said it felt odd for frontier AI firms to approach the government asking to be regulated, calling it ‘‘a little bit weird’’ and likening it to a Trojan horse. House Speaker Mike Johnson suggested platform leaders should meet with lawmakers to find a balance that avoids a moratorium because of concerns about China overtaking the US, and Senator Bernie Sanders voiced agreement with calls to pause AI development made by columnist Peggy Noonan.

The exchange underscores a widening debate over how to govern advanced AI: companies are proposing independent evaluation and shared standards while political figures weigh those proposals against national security and economic competition considerations. How US policymakers and major AI firms resolve tensions between safety measures and international competitiveness could affect the shape of near‑term regulation and industry norms.