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A federal judge in California temporarily blocked the U.S. Department of Defense from enforcing its designation of Anthropic as a national security “supply chain risk,” a move that had threatened to cut the AI company off from federal work and pressure contractors to stop using its technology. The dispute began after President Donald Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth moved to halt government use of Anthropic tools and formally label the company a risk following Anthropic’s refusal to permit uses tied to mass surveillance of Americans and fully autonomous lethal targeting. Anthropic sued, arguing the government retaliated against protected speech and imposed the designation without notice or a meaningful chance to respond.
In granting a preliminary injunction, the court said Anthropic was likely to succeed on First Amendment, due process, and Administrative Procedure Act claims, finding the government’s stated sabotage and wartime-disablement rationale appeared unsupported and that the relevant law was likely misapplied. The ruling came after public criticism from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, internal Pentagon guidance allowing limited exemptions because Anthropic tools were difficult to remove from some systems, and reports that federal agencies continued testing Anthropic’s cyber-focused Mythos model despite the ban. Subsequent White House discussions signaled the administration may soften its stance even as the Pentagon expanded AI deals with other major tech firms and litigation over Anthropic’s federal status continued.
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The White House began preparing guidance that would let federal agencies bypass the Pentagon’s designation and potentially resume use of Anthropic tools, signaling a softening policy position.
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei met with White House officials, including Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, as the administration reconsidered its stance in light of Anthropic’s new Mythos cyber model and ongoing litigation.
Reports indicated some federal agencies were testing Anthropic’s advanced Mythos model despite the administration’s restrictions, showing uneven implementation of the ban across government.
The Defense Department announced agreements with eight major technology companies to deploy AI tools on classified networks, expanding its supplier base while continuing to exclude Anthropic pending policy and legal uncertainty.
A federal judge granted Anthropic a preliminary injunction, finding it likely to succeed on First Amendment, due process, and APA claims and temporarily blocking enforcement of the Pentagon’s supply-chain-risk designation.
At a hearing in federal court in San Francisco, Judge Rita F. Lin appeared skeptical of the Pentagon’s arguments as Anthropic sought a preliminary injunction against the designation and related restrictions.
Senator Elizabeth Warren sent a letter to Defense Secretary Hegseth calling the Anthropic designation apparent retaliation and warning the Pentagon may be pressuring companies to support surveillance and autonomous weapons uses.
Anthropic filed suit challenging the Defense Department’s supply-chain-risk designation and related restrictions, alleging unlawful retaliation and violations including First Amendment claims.
A March 6 internal memo signed by Pentagon CIO Kirsten Davies created a process for limited exemptions to the Anthropic phaseout when use was critical to national security and no viable alternative existed.
The Pentagon formally told Anthropic it had been designated a supply-chain risk, making the administration’s earlier public action an official procurement and national security measure.
On the same day, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth announced Anthropic would be designated a supply chain risk for military-related business, triggering a broader government phaseout and restrictions affecting defense contracting.
President Donald Trump publicly directed federal agencies to stop using Anthropic AI tools, escalating a dispute over Anthropic’s refusal to permit uses such as domestic mass surveillance and fully autonomous lethal targeting.
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The U.S. Department of Defense has escalated a dispute with **Anthropic** over the conditions under which its AI models could be used by the military, after Anthropic reportedly insisted on limits including *no mass surveillance of Americans* and *no fully autonomous weapons*. Reporting cited in both accounts indicates Pentagon officials have discussed potentially designating Anthropic a **“supply chain risk”**—a step that could bar the company from government work and pressure defense contractors to sever ties—while at least one senior official was quoted as saying the department would “make sure they pay a price” for non-cooperation. At the same time, the Pentagon is engaging **Anthropic, OpenAI, Google, and xAI** to align all major U.S. AI providers on a common “baseline” of expectations, after contracts were signed with limited specificity and the department now wants to deploy models into DoD environments to enable broader development of AI agents with minimal human oversight. The coverage also describes the policy vacuum driving the standoff: key rules for military AI use are being shaped through ad hoc negotiations between the Pentagon and private AI firms, prompting calls for **Congress** to set durable, democratically accountable constraints rather than leaving governance to bilateral bargaining.
Jun 29, 2026
Anthropic alleged that three China-based AI labs—**DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, and MiniMax**—used roughly **24,000 fraudulent accounts** to generate more than **16 million interactions** with Claude in a coordinated effort to extract the model’s advanced reasoning, coding, and tool-use capabilities. The company said it linked the activity through IP correlations, request metadata, and infrastructure indicators, and warned that large-scale unauthorized distillation could remove safety guardrails and enable copied capabilities to be used in offensive cyber operations, disinformation, intelligence collection, and mass surveillance. Anthropic said it shared its findings with U.S. government entities and industry partners, while noting it had no evidence that the Chinese government directly coordinated the campaigns. The allegations surfaced as Anthropic remains in a separate high-stakes dispute with the U.S. Department of Defense, which on June 4 refused to reverse the company’s designation as a supply-chain risk. Anthropic is challenging the Pentagon’s March blacklisting after Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth invoked emergency powers following failed talks over limits on Claude’s use for domestic surveillance and autonomous weapons. Federal attorneys told the court the procedural dispute over administrative remedies is now moot because the secretary has denied reconsideration, and reporting indicates a majority of the appellate panel appeared inclined to let the designation stand while the case proceeds.
Jun 29, 2026
Defense Secretary **Pete Hegseth** reportedly threatened to invoke the **Defense Production Act (DPA)** to compel *Anthropic* to provide its AI technology to the Pentagon on government terms, escalating a dispute over how Anthropic’s models can be used in national security missions. Reporting indicates Anthropic has resisted terms that would allow use of its models for **autonomous weapons** or **mass domestic surveillance**, citing safety and governance concerns, while the Defense Department has pushed for broader, open-ended access as it expands its AI-enabled military capabilities. Legal analysis notes the DPA is a Korean War-era statute with multiple authorities, and the practical impact depends on what, specifically, the government demands. The DPA has already been applied to AI in prior policy (including information-gathering authorities used to require reporting on training and testing), but the reported threat appears aimed at the DPA’s stronger **Title I** compulsion powers—an approach that maps awkwardly from traditional industrial mobilization to modern disputes over AI model access and safety guardrails, and that raises questions about whether **Congress** should set binding rules for military AI use rather than leaving them to executive-branch leverage or private-company policies.
Jun 29, 2026