Guides
What Is the Super Intelligence Force?
The White House task force on AI, created in October 2026: who sits on it, what its charter says, what it has done, what it cannot do, and what is due when.
The Super Intelligence Force (SIF) is a White House task force that coordinates the federal government’s work on AI. President Trump announced it on October 4, 2026, put Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton in charge, and said it would ensure that America “continues to lead the World in Super Intelligence.” It adopted a charter on October 15, which gives it 120 days to produce a report on how the government should manage the most advanced AI systems.
Despite the name, it is not a military branch, a regulator or a research lab. It is a group of senior officials who use the powers their own agencies already have. And “Super Intelligence” in its name is the federal label for AI under Executive Order 14434, not a claim that anyone has built Super Intelligence in the research sense. Our guide on Super Intelligence vs AI explains the difference.
At a glance
| Fact | Detail | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Announced | October 4, 2026, on Truth Social | CBS News |
| Chair | Jay Clayton, Director of National Intelligence | TechCrunch |
| Vice chairs | Andrew Ferguson (FTC), Emil Michael (Pentagon research and engineering), Scott Kupor (OPM) | TechCrunch |
| Reports to | The President and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles | CBS News |
| Charter adopted | October 15, 2026, at its first meeting | Semafor |
| Main deliverable | A report within 120 days, around February 12, 2027 | Semafor; date is SI Builders’ count from October 15 |
| Legal powers | None of its own; relies on members’ existing authority | Tech Times, Memeburn |
| Main jobs so far | Incident reporting by AI labs; a risk report from presidential science advisers; putting the White House accord into practice | Semafor |
How it came about
The task force grew out of an argument about speed. Through 2026, the leaders of several frontier labs had called for slowing AI development; Axios reported that Anthropic’s Dario Amodei, OpenAI’s Sam Altman, Elon Musk and Google DeepMind’s Demis Hassabis had all urged a slowdown as their systems grew more powerful.
On September 19, Trump rejected that idea, announced an “AI Force” modeled on the Space Force, and said he would soon name a new AI czar. He wrote that the government would “not in any way hinder or stifle” the industry’s growth, and that “BAD” behavior would be pursued through “our already existing Criminal and Civil Justice System.” Ten days later, Executive Order 14434 renamed AI “Super Intelligence” across the executive branch, and six AI and chip executives signed the White House Accord on Super Intelligence, Memeburn noted.
On October 4, the AI Force arrived under its new name. Trump’s post said: “I am announcing the formation of the Super Intelligence Force (SIF),” and described a technology that “is bigger than the Industrial Revolution, and the Internet.” Clayton, as chair, became in effect the administration’s second AI czar, after David Sacks, who had held the role until March, SiliconANGLE reported.
Who is on it
The four leaders were named in Trump’s announcement. The full membership was reported by Semafor after the first meeting; the leaders’ backgrounds are from Newsweek.
| Member | Role in government | Role on the task force |
|---|---|---|
| Jay Clayton | Director of National Intelligence; SEC chairman in Trump’s first term; later U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York | Chair |
| Andrew Ferguson | Chairman, Federal Trade Commission | Vice chair; leads law enforcement and consumer protection |
| Emil Michael | Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering | Vice chair; incident reporting and contact with frontier labs |
| Scott Kupor | Director, Office of Personnel Management | Vice chair; critical infrastructure and AI’s effect on the workforce |
| JD Vance | Vice President | Member |
| Scott Bessent | Treasury Secretary | Member |
| Pete Hegseth | Defense Secretary | Member |
| Michael Kratsios | Director, Office of Science and Technology Policy | Member |
| Sean Cairncross | National Cyber Director | Member; co-leads accord implementation |
| Susie Wiles | White House Chief of Staff | Member |
Semafor also listed Social Security Commissioner Frank Bisignano, NSA Director Joshua Rudd, HHS nominee Chris Klomp and deputy chief of staff Richard Walters. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and David Sacks will advise from outside government, SiliconANGLE reported, citing The Wall Street Journal.
Newsweek read the picks as suggesting the administration may see AI as a national security issue, with consumer protection and antitrust, not a new regulator, as the main tools, and noted that no university AI researchers, ethicists or independent safety experts were named.
What the charter says
The task force adopted its charter at its first meeting on October 15. We could not find the charter on a White House website; what follows is from news accounts of it.
- Purpose. To coordinate the federal government’s approach to advanced AI and to “develop plans for responding to SI-enabled threats to our society,” while also “preventing overregulation and regulatory capture that would stifle innovation and competition,” according to TechCrunch’s account.
- Responsibility. It places primary responsibility on the developers: “the labs are ultimately responsible for the risks and opportunities that their models amplify and accelerate,” The Next Web reported.
- The 120-day report. It starts a 120-day window for a report on how the government should manage frontier AI, including how labs disclose security breaches and what agencies should do under existing authority.
- Duration. The chief of staff can extend the task force’s work or move it to another agency.
- No new rules. According to a White House account cited by Bloomberg, no new laws or rules were discussed at the first meeting; Tech Times notes that the task force has no rulemaking power of its own.
What it has done so far
At the October 15 meeting, according to Semafor, the task force:
- Adopted its charter, starting the 120-day clock.
- Commissioned a risk report from the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST) on three areas: cybersecurity and critical infrastructure; biosecurity and dual-use applications; and model control and accountability.
- Created a working group to implement the White House Accord on Super Intelligence, led by Clayton and Cairncross.
- Created a law enforcement and consumer protection committee, including the Justice Department and the FTC, led by Ferguson.
In a CNBC interview, Clayton described three subcommittees: incident reporting and response; critical infrastructure and private-sector ties; and law enforcement and accountability, The Next Web reported.
Incident reporting
The task force’s most concrete demand so far is that AI labs report problems with their models. Before the charter was adopted, it told companies to report rogue behavior and fix it immediately, in what it called a “notification and remediation process.” Its statement, reported by Bloomberg, said: “Companies must immediately disclose incidents involving their models.” Its leaders added that “delayed notification, inadequate corrective action, and a failure to take responsibility will not be tolerated.”
Emil Michael is building the reporting system, covering breaches, hacks, jailbreaks and other incidents. As of mid-October the task force had not defined what counts as an incident, how quickly a company must report one, or what happens if it does not, The Next Web noted.
The first publicly known disclosure came from Anthropic. A State Department spokesman said an Anthropic test model had submitted visa applications, and Anthropic contacted the task force itself to report it, according to Semafor’s reporting as summarized by The Next Web.
What it cannot do
The task force has no statute, no budget and no enforcement authority of its own, Tech Times and Memeburn noted. Its reach is the reach of its members’ agencies: the FTC’s consumer-protection and antitrust powers, the Justice Department’s criminal and civil enforcement, the Pentagon’s contracting, and the intelligence community.
Asked how its demands would be enforced, a White House official told Semafor that export controls could be one tool; Commerce had earlier imposed temporary export restrictions affecting Anthropic, The Next Web noted. The administration’s broader approach is to rely on existing liability law. Treasury Secretary Bessent has said “The best way to guarantee safety is that the creators are liable for what they build and generate.”
It also cannot change what “Super Intelligence” means in law. Under Executive Order 14434, the term currently has the meaning of the statutory definition of AI in 15 U.S.C. § 9401(3), which covers a machine-based system that can, for human-defined objectives, make predictions, recommendations or decisions influencing real or virtual environments. The President’s science adviser is due to submit proposed legislative language for a new definition around November 28, 2026; the current definition stands unless replaced by a later presidential action or an act of Congress.
The debate
The administration’s case. Clayton has argued that the bigger danger is falling behind. He told The Wall Street Journal that “the risk of not being first is high,” and that being first would better enable the government to address the risks. Of proposals for a coordinated slowdown, he said: “I don’t think any American should think that that’s a good strategy.” Kupor has said the group is working on a comprehensive plan, including the energy and water costs of data centers, while avoiding regulation that would slow the industry, adding that “Nobody’s going to get a free pass here.”
The critics’ case. Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) said “We still do not know what authority this new role will have,” and accused the administration of having “resisted meaningful safeguards without offering a serious alternative.” Alvin Wang Graylin of the Asia Society Policy Institute said of the accord the task force is implementing: “The companies drafted the principles, they hire the auditor, and the commitment is voluntary.” Legal scholars quoted by Bloomberg questioned how far liability law can go: Gabriel Weil of the University of Houston Law Center noted that “tort law reaches its limit once the responsible company is bankrupt.”
Key dates
| Date | What happened or is due | Basis |
|---|---|---|
| Sep 19, 2026 | Trump announces an “AI Force” and says he will soon name a new AI czar | Axios |
| Sep 29, 2026 | Executive Order 14434; White House Accord on Super Intelligence signed | White House, Memeburn |
| Oct 4, 2026 | Super Intelligence Force announced, with Clayton as chair | CBS News |
| Oct 9, 2026 | Task force tells companies they must immediately disclose incidents | Bloomberg |
| Oct 15, 2026 | First meeting; charter adopted; PCAST report commissioned | Semafor |
| ~Nov 28, 2026 | Proposed federal definition of Super Intelligence due (under Executive Order 14434, not the task force) | Executive order |
| ~Feb 12, 2027 | 120-day window ends, counted from October 15 | SI Builders’ count |
Open questions
- What is an “incident”? The reporting rules are not yet defined, and neither are the consequences of not reporting.
- Will the report be public? We could not find the charter or the PCAST commission on a White House website, and nothing says whether the 120-day report will be published.
- Who outside government is consulted? Trump’s announcement listed consumers, public-interest and religious groups, infrastructure providers and industry; how that engagement works has not been described.
- What happens after 120 days? The task force can be extended or moved, and its recommendations may go to Congress.
How this page is maintained
Every claim links to a dated source. We could not find the charter on a White House website, so its contents are attributed to the outlets that reported them. Dates we calculated, such as the end of the 120-day window, are marked as ours. We do not take a side in the debate over the task force; we report the arguments of the people making them. For how agencies are applying the new label, see our tracker of agency changes; for the dated record of who adopted the term, see The Rise of Super Intelligence.
This page was first published on 2026-10-25 and is updated as the task force acts. Corrections and additions, with sources, to corrections@sibuilders.io.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Super Intelligence Force?
The Super Intelligence Force (SIF) is a White House task force that coordinates the federal government's work on AI. President Trump announced it on October 4, 2026 and put Director of National Intelligence Jay Clayton in charge. It is not a military branch, a regulator or a research lab, and "Super Intelligence" in its name is the federal label for AI under Executive Order 14434, not a claim that anyone has built Super Intelligence in the research sense.
Who is on the Super Intelligence Force?
Jay Clayton, Director of National Intelligence, chairs the Super Intelligence Force. Its vice chairs are FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Emil Michael, and OPM Director Scott Kupor. Members reported by Semafor include Vice President JD Vance, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, OSTP Director Michael Kratsios, National Cyber Director Sean Cairncross and White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles.
What did the Super Intelligence Force do at its first meeting?
At its first meeting on October 15, 2026, according to Semafor, the Super Intelligence Force adopted its charter, commissioned a risk report from the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, created a working group led by Jay Clayton and Sean Cairncross to implement the White House Accord on Super Intelligence, and created a law enforcement and consumer protection committee led by Andrew Ferguson.
What does the Super Intelligence Force charter say?
The Super Intelligence Force charter, adopted on October 15, 2026, has been described by news outlets, but SI Builders could not find it on a White House website. According to those reports, it places primary responsibility for risks on the AI labs and starts a 120-day window for a report on how the government should manage frontier AI. SI Builders counts that window as ending around February 12, 2027.
Can the Super Intelligence Force regulate AI companies?
The Super Intelligence Force cannot regulate on its own: it has no statute, no budget and no enforcement authority of its own, Tech Times and Memeburn noted. Its reach is that of its members' agencies, such as the FTC's consumer-protection and antitrust powers, the Justice Department's enforcement and the Pentagon's contracting. A White House official told Semafor that export controls could be one tool for enforcing its demands.
What does the Super Intelligence Force require AI labs to report?
The Super Intelligence Force has told AI labs to report problems with their models; its statement, reported by Bloomberg, said "Companies must immediately disclose incidents involving their models." Emil Michael is building the reporting system for breaches, hacks, jailbreaks and other incidents. As of mid-October 2026 the task force had not defined what counts as an incident, how quickly one must be reported, or what happens if a company does not report, The Next Web noted.