Sam Altman told staff Washington wants GPT-5.6 released first to a short list of trusted partners, with access approved customer by customer.
For years the debate over slowing down powerful AI models was a matter for company safety teams and outside critics. Now it has a government request attached.
The Trump administration has asked OpenAI to stagger the release of an upcoming model the first time the US government has preemptively asked an American AI company to restrict a launch before it happens.
The instruction reached employees from the top. OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman told staff on Wednesday that the government had requested the company initially release the model to a short list of trusted partners before pushing it out more widely.
The government, Altman told staff, would be “approving access customer by customer during this preview period.”
