On June 4, 2026, a coalition published “An Open Letter in Support of Mandatory Nucleic Acid Synthesis Screening and Recordkeeping,” organized by the Institute for Progress and the Foundation for American Innovation. Its signatories included the CEOs of the leading AI labs - Sam Altman of OpenAI, Dario Amodei of Anthropic, Demis Hassabis of Google DeepMind, and Mustafa Suleyman of Microsoft AI - alongside Nobel laureate David Baker, national security veterans, and the synthetic-DNA manufacturers Twist Bioscience, Ansa Biotechnologies, and ATUM. Rival labs rarely sign the same document, which is part of what made this notable.
The letter asks Congress to make it mandatory for providers of synthesized DNA and RNA, and for makers of the synthesis machines, to screen orders against databases of dangerous sequences, verify customer legitimacy before shipping, and keep records to support biosecurity investigations. The argument is that AI is eroding the knowledge barrier that historically kept bioweapon design out of reach: signatories note that frontier models now match or exceed PhD-level virologists on technical laboratory questions, even as the real-world threat picture remains contested. The letter explicitly urges that Congress “should act this session.”
The push connects a frontier-AI safety concern to a concrete, narrow legislative ask rather than a broad moratorium, and it lines up with a bipartisan Senate effort, the Biosecurity Modernization and Innovation Act of 2026, to require gene-synthesis suppliers to screen orders and customers. For readers tracking how AI risk arguments turn into policy, this is a clear example of labs converging on a specific regulatory chokepoint.