Trump admin. moves further into AI oversight, will test Google, Microsoft and xAI models

U.S. President Donald Trump disembarks from Air Force One upon arrival from Miami on May 3, 2026 at Joint Base Andrews, Florida. Roberto Schmidt | The Center for AI Standards and Innovation on Tuesday announced agreements with Google DeepMind, Microsoft and Elon Musk's xAI that will allow the U.S. government to evaluate artificial intelligence models before they are publicly available. CAISI, which sits under the U.S. Department of Commerce, will "conduct pre-deployment evaluations and targeted research to better assess frontier AI capabilities and advance the state of AI security," according to a release. The announcement builds on CAISI's previous partnerships with OpenAI and Anthropic from 2024, the center said. Those agreements have been renegotiated to reflect CAISI's directives from the Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and America's AI Action Plan, according to the release. Beyond CAISI's announcement on Tuesday, the White House has been weighing the creation of a new AI working group that would explore potential oversight procedures, including plans to vet models before they're released to the public, CNBC confirmed. The working group would bring together a variety of tech executives and government officials, according to a source close to the discussions who asked not to be named because the details are confidential. The group may be established through an executive order. …