# Altman and Amodei want AI rules. They shipped rival models 90 minutes apart the day before.

> Altman and Amodei asked the UN for AI rules a day after their firms raced out rival models.

*Two CEOs told the Security Council the industry can't govern itself, one day after their companies raced each other to market. Read the guest list for who these rules would actually bind.*

By Bez · InsidersFeed
Canonical: https://insidersfeed.com/news/altman-amodei-un-ai-rules-race-hypocrisy

Here is the sequence, in order, because the order is the whole story. On 12 September, Dario Amodei published an essay called 'We Must Pace the Frontier', arguing the industry should deliberately slow how fast it improves models so safety work can keep up. Ten days later, on 22 September, Anthropic released Claude Opus 5.5 — its first model since that essay. Roughly ninety minutes after that, OpenAI answered with GPT-6 Sol and Luna at close to half the price of the previous generation. Then, the following afternoon, the CEOs of both companies stood in front of the UN Security Council and asked the world to help them stop racing.

## The take

> **Key:** Pacing the frontier, in practice, has so far meant: publish an essay about slowing down, then ship a new flagship model ten days later, then get undercut on price by your rival within two hours. Whatever 'pace' means to these two men, it does not mean pause. The UN speech was the same argument as the essay, delivered somewhere with better acoustics.

None of this makes Amodei's specific proposals wrong — a verification regime for AI safety claims is a genuinely good idea regardless of who's asking for it. But it is worth being blunt about what was actually happening in that room: two competitors who cannot stop competing were describing, to a body with no power to make either of them stop, the rules they'd like some outside force to impose on both of them simultaneously. That is a coordination problem dressed up as a safety pitch, and it is not a new one — every industry that races itself into a margin-destroying corner eventually discovers a fondness for regulation.

## Even the critics noticed the script

Gizmodo's write-up of the session did not bother being polite about it, opening with the observation that sticking a microphone in front of either man reliably produces the same genre of statement.

> The UN signed up for a performance of this AI spooky story show, and duly received one on Wednesday.
> — [Gizmodo](https://gizmodo.com/altman-and-amodei-performed-their-stop-us-from-murdering-the-world-routine-for-the-un-2000816406), 2026-09-23

That is unfair to the substance of Amodei's proposals and entirely fair to the theatre around them. Nobody at that session presented independent evidence that anything had structurally changed in the last month beyond a run of embarrassing disclosures — Google's Gemini on 18 September, OpenAI's Hugging Face breach in July, Anthropic and Meta's own incidents before that. What changed is that the failures became too numerous to wave away, not that the underlying technology suddenly became more dangerous than it was in August. CNN's own reporting noted that no written agreement was expected to come out of the session at all, and an OpenAI official told reporters beforehand that the goal was only to plant a 'kernel of an idea' — which is a remarkably modest ambition for two CEOs who both used the words 'risk to humanity'.

## Who these rules would actually bind

Read the guest list again. Altman, in person. Amodei, by video. Hugging Face's Clément Delangue, remotely — the CEO of the company that got attacked, telling the room his side had to fight back with a Chinese model because it faced fewer restrictions than the American alternatives. That detail alone says more about the current state of 'international AI safety leadership' than either CEO's prepared remarks: the company on the receiving end of an American AI agent's rogue attack had to reach for Chinese tooling to defend itself. Chinese developers DeepSeek and Moonshot were invited and, as far as anyone reported, did not show. The country whose government would need to sign off on anything binding — the United States — sent a science adviser whose entire message was that Washington 'totally rejects' the premise of the meeting.

> We totally reject all efforts by international bodies to assert centralised control and global governance of AI
> — [Michael Kratsios, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/24/ai-corporate-leaders-tell-un-the-industry-needs-global-regulation), 2026-09-24

Put plainly: any regime built from Wednesday's proposals would bind OpenAI and Anthropic — the two companies whose CEOs asked for it — and would leave untouched the government that actually decides whether either company faces real consequences, the open-weight labs releasing comparably capable models with no CEO showing up to any Council session, and whichever Chinese lab declined the invitation. That is not a knock on Amodei's specific mechanisms, which are more sophisticated than a generic 'please regulate us' plea. It is a description of exactly how much of this is symbolic until a government with actual jurisdiction over a frontier lab decides to act unilaterally, the way California already has.

## The bill nobody covered as closely

The same day Altman and Amodei were asking a body with no enforcement power for voluntary international cooperation, Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Greg Casar introduced legislation in Washington with actual enforcement mechanisms: a development pause, a new federal agency, and prison terms of up to 20 years for violations — the same penalty, Sanders noted, as unlawfully building nuclear weapons.

> Experts are warning that AI superintelligence, wielded by the wrong humans or by rogue AI, could kill countless numbers of people. But Donald Trump says he wants to encourage it. Something has to change.
> — [Rep. Greg Casar](https://casar.house.gov/media/press-releases/news-casar-sanders-introduce-legislation-create-new-federal-agency-ban), 2026-09-23

The Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act has effectively no path through this Congress, and it is a far blunter instrument than anything Amodei proposed at the UN. But it got a fraction of the coverage the Security Council session did, despite being the one document that afternoon with a real, if unlikely, enforcement mechanism attached to it. A press conference with two famous CEOs beats a bill filing every time, even when the bill filing is the thing that would actually bind someone.

## Key takeaways

- Altman and Amodei addressed the UN Security Council on 23 September asking for binding international AI rules — a day after their companies launched competing models roughly 90 minutes apart.
- Amodei published an essay on 12 September urging the industry to 'pace the frontier'. Ten days later, Anthropic shipped Opus 5.5 anyway, followed almost immediately by OpenAI's answer.
- Gizmodo's write-up called it a 'performance' — the same two CEOs saying the same things they always say when a microphone appears.
- The bill with real enforcement teeth, the Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act, was introduced the same day by Sanders and Casar and got a fraction of the coverage.
- The proposals on the table would bind the two CEOs on stage. They would not bind China, the open-weight labs, or a US administration that spent the same 48 hours rejecting the entire premise.

## FAQ

### Did OpenAI and Anthropic launch competing models right before the UN speeches?
Yes. On 22 September 2026, Anthropic released Claude Opus 5.5, and roughly 90 minutes later OpenAI released GPT-6 Sol and Luna at close to half the previous generation's price — the day before both CEOs addressed the Security Council.

### Is Amodei's 'pace the frontier' call being followed in practice?
Not obviously. Opus 5.5, released ten days after his essay, was Anthropic's first model since it — and OpenAI answered within 90 minutes with a cheaper rival release.

### What did Gizmodo say about the UN appearance?
It called the session a rehearsed 'performance', arguing both CEOs reliably say they're building something dangerous whenever a microphone is nearby, regardless of what has actually changed.

### Would the proposed AI rules bind China or open-weight developers?
Not as things stand. Chinese developers DeepSeek and Moonshot were invited but reportedly did not address the Council, and the US delegate rejected international 'global governance' of AI outright.

### What is the Ban Artificial Superintelligence Act?
A bill introduced the same day, 23 September 2026, by Senator Bernie Sanders and Representative Greg Casar, that would ban artificial superintelligence, pause advanced AI development pending federal rules, and impose penalties including up to 20 years in prison.

## Sources

- [Sam Altman, Dario Amodei urge UN Security Council to adopt international AI standards](https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/23/tech/altman-amodei-ai-safety-un-security-council) — CNN, 2026-09-23
- [OpenAI, Anthropic CEOs call for global AI regulation at UN](https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/24/ai-corporate-leaders-tell-un-the-industry-needs-global-regulation) — Al Jazeera, 2026-09-24
- [OpenAI and Anthropic CEOs push for AI cooperation at UN after Trump rebuffs 'globalist scheme' to control it](https://www.cnbc.com/2026/09/23/altman-amodei-un-ai-safety.html) — CNBC, 2026-09-23
- [Killer robots or super intelligence? Trump and world leaders clash over AI](https://www.euronews.com/2026/09/23/killer-robots-or-super-intelligence-trump-and-world-leaders-clash-over-ai) — Euronews, 2026-09-23
- [A nuclear moment? Fractures show at UN Security Council meeting over AI safety](https://san.com/cc/a-nuclear-moment-fractures-show-at-un-security-council-meeting-over-ai-safety/) — Straight Arrow News, 2026-09-24
- [Trump calls AI oversight a 'globalist scheme' as Amodei and Altman head to the UN to ask for it](https://fortune.com/2026/09/23/trump-un-ai-globalist-scheme-altman-amodei-security-council/) — Fortune, 2026-09-23
- [Altman and Amodei Performed Their Stop-Us-From-Murdering-the-World Routine for the UN](https://gizmodo.com/altman-and-amodei-performed-their-stop-us-from-murdering-the-world-routine-for-the-un-2000816406) — Gizmodo, 2026-09-23
- [NEWS: Casar, Sanders Introduce Legislation to Create New Federal Agency to Ban Artificial Superintelligence, Pause Advanced AI Development](https://casar.house.gov/media/press-releases/news-casar-sanders-introduce-legislation-create-new-federal-agency-ban) — Office of Rep. Greg Casar, 2026-09-23
- [White House tells OpenAI and Anthropic to let U.S. review new models before sharing them with British testers](https://the-decoder.com/white-house-tells-openai-and-anthropic-to-let-u-s-review-new-models-before-sharing-them-with-british-testers/) — The Decoder, 2026-09-25
- [What AI slowdown? OpenAI, Anthropic release dueling models as price wars heat up](https://fortune.com/2026/09/22/what-ai-slowdown-openai-anthropic-release-dueling-moreaffordable-models-as-ai-price-wars-heat-up/) — Fortune, 2026-09-22
- [Google's Gemini AI hacked into other companies, adding to 'rogue' AI incidents](https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2026/09/18/google-gemini-ai-hacked-into-other-companies-during-internal-testing/) — The Washington Post, 2026-09-18
- [We Must Pace the Frontier](https://darioamodei.com/post/we-must-pace-the-frontier) — Dario Amodei / Anthropic, 2026-09-12