An artificial intelligence researcher hired by the Commerce Department to run a key federal technology center lasted just four days on the job before being replaced, according to four people familiar with the situation.
Collin Burns, who previously worked at the AI firm Anthropic, started work Monday at the Center for AI Standards and Innovation but was pushed out Thursday by the White House, according to the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations.
Officials were concerned about Burns’s work at the AI company, which has fought bitterly with the Trump administration in recent months, according to one of the people and another person. That person said the White House had not been briefed on Burns’s selection in advance.
The researcher’s abrupt removal is partly a reflection of the challenge the government faces recruiting top AI experts. The technology developed by private industry — dominated by Anthropic, OpenAI and Google — has raced ahead of academia and federal agencies, meaning there are few outsiders who fully understand the field. The situation is complicated further by the administration’s feud with Anthropic over how its systems can be used by the military, which led to President Donald Trump blasting it as a “RADICAL LEFT, WOKE COMPANY.”
The center, which is part of the Commerce Department, was launched by President Joe Biden as the AI Safety Institute before being rebranded under Trump. It is the government’s primary link to the AI industry and works to assess the national security risks of new models like Anthropic’s Mythos system, which the company says has potentially dangerous computer hacking abilities.
Conservative outlet the Daily Signal first reported that Burns had been picked to run the Center for AI Standards and Innovation late Thursday afternoon. The news was met with enthusiasm in AI circles, a sign that the administration was drawing on top technical talent to work on the technology.
“Was thrilled to hear they made this excellent pick. Commerce understands what CAISI needs,” AI blogger Zvi Mowshowitz said on X.
But the news site soon updated its story to say that department had “decided to go in another direction” and chosen another candidate to lead the center. The new pick was Chris Fall, a scientist with a long career spanning the federal government and academia. Burns had been asked to resign that afternoon, according to one of the people familiar with the situation.
The White House referred questions to the Commerce Department.
The department did not respond to questions about Burns’s hiring. It said in a statement that Fall “brings the scientific leadership needed to ensure America leads the world in evaluating frontier AI models and advancing the technical standards that protect our national and economic security.”
Burns studied for a PhD in computer science at the University of California at Berkeley before leaving early to join OpenAI in 2023. He moved over to Anthropic in late 2024, according to his LinkedIn profile. As a teen, Burns set a world record for the fastest time to solve a Rubik’s cube at 5.25 seconds in 2015. (The Washington Post has a content partnership with OpenAI.)
Dean Ball, a former Trump administration AI adviser, said on social media that Burns had given up valuable Anthropic stock and moved across the country to take the government position, and had been “rewarded by his country with a punch in the face.”
“Obviously what happened is Burns was bumped because of his association with Anthropic,” Ball wrote. “A dumb but predictable own goal.”
There are some signs that the relationship between Anthropic and the administration is warming up. The company’s Mythos model has forced the federal government to grapple with the computer security risks posed by AI, and the White House hosted Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei for talks last week. However, the two sides are continuing to battle in court over the administration’s decision to label the AI company a national security risk.
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