Chris Fall has resigned from his position as the director of the Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI), as confirmed by agency sources.
Fall, who assumed the role just three months ago, succeeded Collin Burns, who left the position within a week. Reports indicated that Burns was “pushed out” due to his previous affiliation with Anthropic, amidst tensions between the company and the Trump administration.
The reason for Fall’s departure has not been disclosed. Prior to his role at CAISI, he served as the director of the Department of Energy’s Office of Science during the initial Trump administration, and had been acting director at the DOE’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy. His career also includes time at the Office of Naval Research.
Before both Burns and Fall, the agency was headed by venture capitalist David Sacks, who held the title of White House AI and Crypto Czar before stepping down in March.
CAISI, which operates under the National Institute of Standards and Technology, takes the lead in establishing technical standards and testing methods for artificial intelligence models while also focusing on cybersecurity risk assessments. However, it was not the leading agency during a recent incident concerning model risks.
A notable event occurred in June when the U.S. Commerce Department activated a little-known export control that compelled Anthropic to withdraw its Mythos and Fable models from circulation. The restrictions were lifted by the end of the month after Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick expressed satisfaction with Anthropic’s safety protocols.
Earlier this month, the White House also enacted an executive order for a new AI safety oversight initiative named “Gold Eagle,” which aims to establish a coordinated effort for addressing cybersecurity vulnerabilities. Several federal agencies were included in this program, but CAISI was not among them.
As Anthropic’s models returned to the market, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis advocated for an independent, industry-driven standards organization to regulate advanced AI, a task that CAISI was originally intended to fulfill.
Fall’s exit also coincides with concerns regarding the recent performance of Chinese AI lab Moonshot’s updated open model Kimi, which showcased competitive capabilities against leading frontier models. The administration is reportedly contemplating measures to ban Chinese open models, a topic that has triggered significant debate and backlash, including from Sacks, who argued against using regulations as a means of protecting U.S. AI companies.
While CAISI has published limited reports on the capabilities of Chinese open-weight models such as Z.ai’s GLM-5.2 and DeepSeek V4 Pro, it has not provided extensive details about its testing methodologies. Since July 9, inquiries regarding the evaluation processes for these large language models have gone unanswered by both the Department of Commerce and NIST.
When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission. This doesn’t affect our editorial independence.
