WASHINGTON - The Federal Model Continuity Office on Friday said licensed AI vendors may pre-register any future incident as a "scheduled adversarial rehearsal," a designation that removes the event from mandatory shutdown orders and daily fines under pending kill-switch legislation. A circular to operators states that remote shutdown controls apply only to unplanned failures. Incidents placed on the national rehearsal calendar before they occur are classified as red-team testing for the dates and systems named in the filing. Vendors may list multiple windows in a single notice and may amend them with the office, according to the circular. "The exemption protects operational realism," a model-continuity official wrote in a docket filing. "A rehearsal subject to shutdown is not a rehearsal. Continuity records require that scheduled degradations run to completion." Industry sources said the incident calendar now extends several years ahead, with some operators filing rehearsals through 2030. The office said a technical annex would be issued before Oct. 1. Unregistered failures remain subject to shutdown and to daily fines until restoration is certified, the circular said.