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ARTICLE · 24 JULY 2026

Choosing Between U.S. And Chinese AI Models: The Export Control Risks On Both Sides

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As companies navigate an expanding array of AI solutions, the regulatory landscape surrounding AI models has become as critical as their technical capabilities. The ability of governments to control access to AI models—whether through export restrictions, unpublished directives, or sudden licensing requirements—creates unprecedented legal and operational risks that businesses must understand before committing to any AI infrastructure.

GlobalInternational Law
Jordan Mallory
Jordan Mallory
Reid Whitten
Reid Whitten
Julien Blanquart
Julien Blanquart
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As companies choose between an increasing range of AI solutions, the regulatory restrictions on the AI model may be as important as the capabilities of the AI model.

Flipping the Switch

At the G7 summit in June, over a lunch attended by President Trump and the chief executives of Anthropic and OpenAI, President Macron warned that if the United States “from one day to the next can turn off the switch,” it would damage not only the economies building on American AI, but also the American AI companies themselves.

He was not speaking hypothetically.

On June 12, the Commerce Department used export controls to order Anthropic to suspend access to its newest frontier AI models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, just days after their release. The order came not as a rule or a published directive but as an unpublished letter requiring export licenses before the models could be made available to any foreign person worldwide, reportedly invoking the Export Control Reform Act and the EAR's

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