NIST WILL NOW TEST GOOGLE, MICROSOFT AND XAI MODELS BEFORE PUBLIC LAUNCH — GOVERNMENT MOVES INSIDE THE LAB The U.S. Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI) announced pre-deployment evaluation agreements with Google DeepMind, Microsoft, and xAI — joining existing pacts with OpenAI and Anthropic — giving federal agencies access to frontier AI models before they go public. The agreements allow government researchers to assess capabilities, security risks, and national security implications ahead of any release. Keywords: CAISI AI testing, NIST AI evaluation, US AI safety policy, pre-deployment AI review