Lauren Kahn

Trump’s $1.5 Trillion Defense Budget Should Not Come as a Surprise In the context of global threats to the United States, a long overdue defense modernization bill, and the ambitions of Trump’s signature defense priorities, perhaps the budget request should have bee…

Want to understand more about the eye popping 1.5T Trump defense budget news? Check out me, @dumbacher.bsky.social, & @laurenakahn.bsky.social for @cfr.org! www.cfr.org/expert-brief... #defense #natsec

Time to Accept Risk in Defense Acquisitions U.S. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth launched enterprising Pentagon reforms that prioritize speed in acquiring new military capabilities, but this ambitious proposal is at risk of running into the …

"The Pentagon’s acquisition system is not built to meet a moment where rapid technological change in areas like AI is shifting the capabilities the U.S. should acquire," write @mchorowitz.bsky.social, @laurenakahn.bsky.social, and @dumbacher.bsky.social for @cfr.org: www.cfr.org/expert-brief...

The Cost of the AGI Delusion By chasing superintelligence, America is falling behind in the real AI race.

“It is unlikely that superintelligence is actually imminent,” write @mchorowitz.bsky.social‬ and @laurenakahn.bsky.social. Washington should not “distort U.S. policy by dashing for something that might not exist.”

The Cost of the AGI Delusion By chasing superintelligence, America is falling behind in the real AI race.

“Washington must ensure that the pursuit of artificial general intelligence does not come at the expense of near-term AI adoption,” write @mchorowitz.bsky.social and @laurenakahn.bsky.social. “Racing toward a myth is not sound policy.”

Quite right. With AI, it seems to be an ever-changing boogeyman of the adjacent possible that we struggle to conceptualize in any real and meaningful way. Often when the worries get decomposed into realistic risks, they are specific to certain narrow contexts and are pretty tractable.

Nuclear Non-Proliferation Is the Wrong Framework for AI Governance | AI Frontiers Michael C. Horowitz, Jun 27, 2025 — Placing AI in a nuclear framework inflates expectations and distracts from practical, sector-specific governance.

In their latest piece for @aifrontiers.bsky.social, PWH's @mchorowitz.bsky.social and @laurenakahn.bsky.social argue that nuclear non-proliferation should not be the model for AI governance. Read more:
ai-frontiers.org/articles/nuc...

We should resist the temptation to use the nuclear age and non-proliferation regime as the basis for #AI policy. It's different tech and the approach won't be effective. My latest with @laurenakahn.bsky.social ⬇️

Thanks, Jon! Couldn’t agree more.

Fixing the Pentagon’s Broken Innovation Pipeline The Pentagon’s outdated budget process is stifling innovation and must be reformed to outpace rising threats. The views in this article are those of the authors alone and do not represent those of the...

The Pentagon’s innovation pipeline isn’t just slow—it’s broken. At DoD, we worked to translate strategy into budget and saw how hard it is to get next-gen tech to warfighters. In our latest, @mchorowitz.bsky.social and I lay out steps to fix it. nationalinterest.org/blog/techlan...

Trump Should Not Abandon March-In Rights Moving forward with the Biden administration’s guidance could deliver lower drug prices and allow more Americans to reap the benefits of public science. In late 2023, the federal government published ...

Have you heard of the Bayh-Dole Act? It's niche, but an incredibly important factor in the U.S. innovation ecosystem!

For the National Interest, @jack-corrigan.bsky.social and I discuss a potential change that could benefit public access to medical drugs.

nationalinterest.org/blog/techlan...

Serving in the Pentagon has been the absolute honor and privilege of my… | Lauren Kahn Serving in the Pentagon has been the absolute honor and privilege of my lifetime. I have just wrapped my year as an IPA as a Policy Advisor for Force Development and Emerging Capabilities (FDEC) in th...

Serving in the Pentagon has been the absolute honor and privilege of my lifetime. I’m especially grateful to the civil servants and members of the armed forces whose dedication to mission shaped my experience and set the standard for public service.

Thank you very much! +++

AI Safety and Automation Bias | Center for Security and Emerging Technology Automation bias is a critical issue for artificial intelligence deployment. It can cause otherwise knowledgeable users to make crucial and even obvious errors. Organizational, technical, and education...

Brief, useful summary from @laurenakahn.bsky.social et al. I'd add a similar but longer-term/larger-scale issue: uncritical AI automation leads to organizational deskilling, so when something happens you don't crash your car but your company... or your country.
cset.georgetown.edu/publication/...