Microsoft's Brad Smith: U.S. AI rules lack transparency, clarity

The U.S. government's recent use of export controls to restrict access to advanced AI models has exposed a regulatory gap. The Commerce Department and White House moved to block or delay releases by Anthropic and OpenAI on security grounds, yet neither the restrictions nor the process behind them followed a formal legal framework. A June executive order set up a voluntary pre-release review process, but when Anthropic declined to cooperate voluntarily, officials reached for export controls—a blunt instrument never designed to govern API-delivered software. The fact that OpenAI and Anthropic faced two different processes within weeks, with no published standards for either and no disclosed criteria for "trusted partners," has left both companies and foreign governments guessing at what the policy actually is.

Smith's point resonates beyond Microsoft: if the U.S. government cannot articulate clear, stable, and legally grounded rules for frontier AI, American tech firms lose credibility abroad. Europe, Canada, and other nations are now treating the Anthropic shutdown as proof that relying on American AI infrastructure is risky—not because the government necessarily intends to cut them off, but because the rules themselves are opaque and the tools chosen (export controls) can be weaponized without warning. Smith suggests the real challenge is not heavier-handed regulation, but smarter regulation: formal legislation that gives the government the legitimate authority it needs while giving companies the certainty they need to invest and operate globally. Without that, sovereigty-focused AI development in Europe and elsewhere may accelerate, potentially fragmenting the AI market and undermining U.S. technology leadership.