A recent U.S. export-control directive forced Anthropic to suspend access to its two most advanced models, Mythos and Fable, for every customer worldwide. After two weeks of negotiations, the U.S. government lifted the controls last week, restoring the flagship Fable model globally, while the most powerful version remains limited to government-approved organizations. OpenAI’s newest model is being rolled out with the U.S. government approving access one customer at a time. The events have positioned the U.S. government as the effective regulator and guardian of new frontier AI models, dictating who has access, when and on what terms. The resolution of the Anthropic standoff entrenches that role, since the company agreed to provide designated U.S. agencies with early access to future frontier models before public release. The launch of a frontier model now involves negotiation with the U.S. government rather than a simple commercial release. Canada’s AI strategy implicitly acknowledges the risk by supporting national AI champion Cohere Inc., and backing open models that no single government can control. Incorporating the issue into our trade negotiations offers the cleanest mechanism.