Officials within the Trump administration are worried that National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross is not equipped to lead the White House’s response to rapidly advancing artificial intelligence models with potentially dangerous hacking capabilities.
Four current U.S. officials and five industry representatives who spoke to POLITICO said they fear Cairncross isn’t moving with sufficient urgency and lacks the expertise to lead on such a technically complex and emergent national security issue.
And more broadly, JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon has relayed to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent his concerns about the speed of the government's response to major potential risks to critical infrastructure posed by new forms of AI, and the need for coordination with the private sector, according to two of the current U.S. officials and two industry representatives with knowledge of the exchange.
These people, like others in this report, were granted anonymity to discuss sensitive policy deliberations and share details of private conversations.
Cairncross has convened a flurry of calls and in-person meetings with corporate executives, security experts and administration officials over the past month about AI security concerns and potential executive action to manage the rollout of new AI models, which have reached a level of coding proficiency surpassing all but the most skilled human minds.
Cairncross previously met with Bessent, White House chief of staff Susie Wiles and Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei at the White House to discuss “advancing innovation and ensuring safety” in scaling up these AI models responsibly.
These conversations were prompted by an announcement from Anthropic last month that its newest AI model, Claude Mythos, could find security flaws in every major operating system and web browser, and that similar technology could become widely available in the next six to 18 months.
Advanced tools like Mythos could help cyber defenders patch security gaps found in their systems more quickly than ever before. But the technology could also greatly increase the speed and scale at which adversaries could launch cyberattacks if it fell into the wrong hands.
“With this model upending literally everything we’re doing, you don’t want someone who doesn’t know what they’re doing at the helm of that,” said the first current U.S. official. Cairncross and the ONCD, they said, “are a little bit over their head.”
In a statement, White House Spokesperson Liz Huston defended Cairncross's performance.
“Sean Cairncross is doing excellent work to protect the American people and our nation’s critical infrastructure from cyber threats, working closely with senior administration officials and American companies to advance shared objectives and priorities — including addressing cybersecurity challenges posed by the rapid scaling of artificial intelligence — while continuing President Trump’s commitment to ensuring American technological dominance,” she wrote.
Spokespeople for the ONCD did not respond to a request for comment.
The White House is considering a raft of executive actions around AI security, which may include requiring tech companies to submit their advanced artificial intelligence models for federal vetting before releasing them to the public.
So far, Anthropic has limited access to Mythos, granting it only to a small group of trusted researchers and companies. OpenAI has similarly confined testing of its advanced AI model, GPT-5.5-Cyber, to a small group of cyber defenders.
Government agencies both in theU.S. and abroad, congressional committees, global banks and regulators are now clamoring for access to these models so they can secure key networks before adversaries such as China access equivalent hacking capabilities — and use them to amplify their attacks.
In a statement, JP Morgan Chase spokesperson Trish Wexler said that the bank appreciates “the leadership of the Administration and the White House on this complex, evolving issue and their continued engagement with critical infrastructure.” A spokesperson for Treasury declined to comment.
Accessing Mythos has been complicated by an ongoing dispute between the Pentagon and Anthropic, following the AI company's attempt to limit the use of its software for mass surveillance or autonomous weapons. The Defense Department declared Anthropic a risk to the country’s national security supply chain in response, an unprecedented legal maneuver that is now being challenged in court.
Cairncross is leading coordination among the White House, government agencies, industry groups and tech companies to inform these policies, despite having little past experience with cybersecurity.
He was given the assignment because he is trusted by Trump and Wiles and is seen as a skilled political operator, according to the second U.S officials and two former national security officials with knowledge of the dynamic.
Before being confirmed by the Senate as the national cyber director in August 2025, Cairncross served as the chief operating officer of the Republican National Committee in 2016 and 2024. In between, he worked as a senior adviser to Trump’s first chief of staff, Reince Priebus, and headed the Millennium Challenge Corp., a federal foreign assistance agency.
While those who spoke to POLITICO acknowledge that what Cairncross has set out to do is no small task, they worry the White House is falling behind at a moment when federal agencies and private companies are anxious for clear federal guidance as these AI tools continue to improve.
“Industry has not received this thing well, government counterparts haven’t, I think he’s wasted an awful lot of time on this,” said the second current U.S. official.
Cairncross cuts a markedly different profile from the previous Senate-confirmed officials who have held the role of national cyber director, a position Congress established in early 2021 to centralize the federal government’s digital policymaking apparatus.
His predecessors, Chris Inglis and Harry Coker Jr., spent decades working on digital security in the U.S. intelligence community before assuming the post under President Joe Biden.
Both supporters and critics say Cairncross is smart and personable and has established himself as the go-to voice on cyber policy in the White House — a key asset that sets him apart from his more experienced predecessors.
Both Coker and Inglis at times struggled to have significant influence in the White House, with Biden instead leaning on a robust cyber policy team on his National Security Council.
“Tier one White House priorities go through the ONCD,” said one of the former national security officials, “because Susie Wiles trusts Sean so much.”
The Trump administration came to office touting a hands-off approach to AI to avoid stifling the development of these tools. But the rapid development of Mythos so alarmed the Trump administration that they opted for a quick course correction with Cairncross at the helm.
Cairncross had spent much of his first year in the administration getting up to speed on cyber priorities and preparing the White House’s National Cyber Strategy — a four-page policy document that called for more aggressive responses to foreign cyberattacks.
But frustration with Cairncross has simmered over the last month, as he spearheaded the administration’s outreach to industry and led its efforts to draft an executive order that could give the federal government more oversight of powerful new AI models.
Ahead of some in-person meetings at the White House, Cairncross’s office sent out a list of questions that some private-sector recipients felt lacked clarity and understanding of AI and federal cyber policy. One question simply asked: “What is the most effective role for the government?”
Cairncross gave a short introduction at some of those meetings and then left, turning the proceedings over to his chief of staff, Lara Smith, said two industry representatives with knowledge of the meeting. Smith worked with Cairncross at the White House and Millennium Challenge Corporation and, like him, does not have a background in tech or cyber policy.
Smith did not immediately respond to a request for comment on her involvement in these meetings.
He’s done the same in some interagency calls with other senior Trump officials about next steps on the AI security EO, frustrating participants who feel Cairncross's presence could speed up the discussions, two of the current U.S. officials said.
The three U.S. officials said Cairncross’s office also tried to fast-track the AI executive order before several agencies were comfortable with its language. Elements of the draft raised privacy or legal issues that other agencies found impractical, the officials added.
According to these three officials, the first draft order met so much resistance in the interagency that it was effectively torn up. Additional drafts have since been in circulation, said two of the current U.S. officials.
“They are just flinging things at the wall until someone gets someone else senior enough to freak out with the West Wing and have it changed,” said the second U.S. official.
Members of Congress are also growing impatient with progress on the AI executive order. On Thursday, a bipartisan group of more than 30 House members urged Cairncross to take action to address the likely influx of AI-powered cyber threats targeting U.S. networks.
Several of those who spoke with POLITICO acknowledged Cairncross is in a tough spot because of cuts to the cyber workforce elsewhere in the administration.
Typically, DHS and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency would play a central role in AI cybersecurity, particularly in shoring up defenses across U.S. critical infrastructure.
But the agency has not had a Senate-confirmed leader since Trump assumed office, and its workforce has been cut down by the Trump administration over the past year and a half.
Trump also made significant cuts to his National Security Council staff last year. Only a handful of those remaining focus on cyber policy, and they do not appear to have been active in formulating the EO, according to one of the U.S. officials and the two former national security officials. Two additional former national security officials confirmed the dynamic.
Cairncross’s own management decisions have exacerbated the problem, several who spoke to POLITICO argued.
Whereas Biden staffed his ONCD with nearly 100 people, Cairncross has surrounded himself with a team of roughly three dozen people, according to one of the U.S. officials and two of the former national security officials. Of those employees, only a small cohort works on policy, they added.
A White House official, granted anonymity to discuss internal staffing decisions, said the administration “is making the federal government more efficient to better serve the American taxpayer.”
Cairncross “just doesn’t have a staff surrounding him who can help him execute these things professionally,” said the second U.S. official.
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