Powerful Cold War-era tool Trump could use in an AI emergency is set to expire in December

One of Washington's most powerful Cold War-era tools could be used by President Donald Trump to rein in artificial intelligence (AI) if the powerful emerging technology ever becomes a national security threat.

Originally enacted in 1950 to mobilize American industry during the Korean War, the Defense Production Act (DPA) has long been used to expand military production, prioritize government contracts and respond to national emergencies. Experts now say those authorities could also give the executive branch significant leverage over frontier AI companies if one of their systems posed catastrophic national security risks.

Exactly how the government could use DPA's powers against a dangerous AI system remains largely untested, but national security and legal experts who spoke with Fox News Digital described a range of existing authorities that could apply — including laws in the act that encompass cyberattacks, exports, federal contracts and civil liability.

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"The authorities could be a little clearer," James Lewis, director of the Strategic Technologies Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told Fox News Digital. "But you could probably cobble together a solution using the legal authorities we have now."

The question has taken on new urgency after leaders at some of the nation's most powerful AI companies issued stark warnings this week about increasingly capable models and backed calls to slow the pace of development so safety measures can catch up.

Trump said this week that the administration already has "tremendous criminal and regulatory power" over AI companies as he pushed back on calls from industry leaders for new guardrails on increasingly powerful models.

That largely remains because Congress recently extended most of the DPA's authorities, which were set to expire on Sept. 30, through Dec. 11, 2026. This is sure to set up another reauthorization fight later this year, right before the power of the legislative body could change after November's midterms in the new year.

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Lewis said the cyber threat has already changed. Finding vulnerabilities that once took months can now take days or even hours, he explained, while AI can help attackers chain smaller weaknesses together into more damaging attacks.

"The threat itself is not new," Lewis said, recounting a recent conversation with a senior official from a Five Eyes intelligence partner. "We've known about this for a while, but people weren't taking it seriously."

AI, he said, has "changed the landscape dramatically."

The Trump administration has already begun building a framework to identify when those capabilities become dangerous.

A June executive order directed federal agencies, including the NSA and CISA, to establish classified benchmarks for advanced cyber capabilities and determine when an AI system should be designated a "covered frontier model." The order also calls for a voluntary framework through which developers can give the government early access to covered models before their release — while expressly stopping short of creating mandatory federal licensing or pre-clearance for frontier AI.

But knowing a dangerous capability exists i