Trump administration works to strengthen defenses against potential AI bioattacks - report

The Trump administration is reviving biosecurity efforts years after slashing related government departments amid growing fears that AI could enable biological attacks.

The Trump administration is working to strengthen security against biological attacks after staffing cuts targeted experts in the field early in US President Donald Trump's second term, as artificial intelligence raises new fears about synthetic pathogens, The Washington Post reported on Monday.

By the end of former president Joe Biden's term, some 30 people were on a team focused on biological security, WaPo wrote, citing three experts who served as government officials. The team coordinated the federal agencies dealing with biohazards and provided scientific guidance to top officials.

When Trump returned to office, the team was cut, and at times, nobody at the White House was dedicated solely to biosecurity, according to the report.

The administration also revoked a 2023 executive order on AI calling for stronger biological safeguards and cast doubt on a 2024 policy that required companies selling genetic components that could be used to create biological agents to screen their customers, a policy multiple experts have called for. 

While Trump called for a revised version by August 2025, no new order has appeared as AI companies say their models are gaining increasingly sophisticated biological capabilities, WaPo wrote. 

Administration touts benefits of AI

The administration has also focused on the potential benefits of AI in these fields.

Trump said that AI could be a tool to aid in preventing disasters caused by biological weapons while speaking to foreign leaders at the United Nations last year and WaPo reported that a former health official who led the effort to rapidly produce a vaccine for COVID-19 during the first Trump administration is now at the Pentagon, working on ways to use AI to develop new defenses against potential pandemics and to deter biowarfare.

However, the departments dealing with biosecurity have been severely depleted.

In addition to the biosecurity team at the White House, the administration also shut down the Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy and a National Security Council unit dedicated to health security. Parts of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security responsible for biological threats were also broken up in the administration's reorganization, the experts said.

The Office of Pandemic Preparedness and Response Policy was reopened in the spring following the start of the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, but experts still believe that is not enough, according to WaPo.

A White House official told WaPo that the administration was working to strengthen Biden-era policy around biosecurity, calling it limited and saying it did not address questions regarding staffing changes, WaPo wrote.

“The Administration’s commitment to addressing AI and biological safety risks is clear and ongoing. The White House has been developing policy for over a year, including in our AI Action Plan last summer,” WaPo cited the official as saying in an email.

OpenAI briefs White House on biological risks

Recently, OpenAI and the White House and half a dozen government agencies have held multiple briefings on biological risks, WaPo cited a person familiar with the meetings as saying.

Earlier in the month, Politico reported that the White House was launching a new initiative involving its cybersecurity office and a top official at the Department of Health and Human Services.

OpenAI also hosted over 50 government experts at a summit in July 2025 to discuss its system's potential use for biodefense, and has since said it has continued to work with the administration to provide a special version of GPT called Rosalind, designed for biodefense, WaPo wrote.

“The Administration has increasingly prioritized this important issue as AI capabilities have expanded, and we welcome their partnership,” an OpenAI spokeswoman told WaPo in an email.

While some scientists call for greater regulation, others fear it may impede important research.

Leading US AI companies restrict their models, but Anthropic loosened its guardrails on its most powerful model this month after repeated complaints from researchers.