Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei used a July 27, 2026 public statement to clarify his position on open-weights AI models, denying support for a blanket ban. He described open-weights models without dangerous capabilities as "a public good" and backed three specific measures: strict enforcement of chip and chipmaking-equipment export controls to China, a crackdown on industrial-scale distillation, and mandatory pre-release safety testing for all sufficiently capable models. Amodei rejected the assertion that broad capability access helps defenders more than attackers, citing biology as a domain with severe offense-defense asymmetry. The market and technical communities remain skeptical, with critics viewing his "safety testing" architecture as a de facto licensing regime that advantages incumbent closed-model providers. Geopolitical realists support chip controls and anti-distillation efforts but express skepticism about their durability given documented smuggling, rapid algorithmic progress, and China's intensifying domestic semiconductor investment.