President Donald Trump ordered all federal agencies on Friday to cease the use of Anthropic technology, escalating tensions between the government and one of the world’s largest artificial intelligence (AI) providers.
After the two sides failed to reach an agreement, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth also directed his department to designate the company a supply-chain risk to national security.
The Department of War had given Anthropic until 5:01 p.m. ET on Friday to agree to open its artificial intelligence for “all lawful purposes,” but Trump’s announcement came roughly an hour before that.
The disagreements between Anthropic and the Pentagon have sparked debate about the use of AI in the military. Here’s what you need to know and what to expect.
Dispute Over AI Use
The disagreement came to a head this week when the Pentagon gave an ultimatum to Anthropic: Allow use of the company’s model for “all lawful purposes” or lose its government contract and be labeled a national security risk.
“This is a simple, common-sense request that will prevent Anthropic from jeopardizing critical military operations and potentially putting our warfighters at risk,” Chief Pentagon spokesman Sean Parnell said in a post on Feb. 26. “We will not let ANY company dictate the terms regarding how we make operational decisions.”
Besides the provision for “all lawful purposes,” it’s unclear what exactly the Pentagon was requesting and the specific terms that prompted disagreement between the two sides.
Parnell’s comments came on the same day that Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei released a statement saying that the Pentagon threatened to remove Anthropic from its systems after negotiations stalled over the company’s request for two exceptions to the “lawful use of our AI model, Claude”: mass domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons.
Amodei said that while he supported the use of AI for foreign intelligence missions, he thought mass domestic surveillance was incompatible with democratic values. He also expressed concern that AI systems were not reliable enough to support fully autonomous weapons, which select and engage targets without human intervention.
Dario Amodei, CEO and co-founder of Anthropic, attends the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Jan. 23, 2025. (Markus Schreiber/AP Photo)
On social media, Parnell said the military had “no interest in using AI to conduct mass surveillance of Americans (which is illegal) nor do we want to use AI to develop autonomous weapons that operate without human involvement.”
Under Secretary of War Emil Michael also accused Anthropic of lying. On social media, he said the department “doesn’t do mass surveillance as that is already illegal.”
“What we are talking about is allowing our warfighters to use AI without having to call [Amodei] for permission to shoot down an enemy drone swarms that would kill Americans,” Michael stated.
Hegseth said in a social media post on Feb. 27 that his department must have full access to Anthropic’s models for “lawful purposes” to defend the country. In designating the company a supply chain risk, the war secretary said that no contractor, supplier, or partner with the U.S. military may conduct any commercial activity with Anthropic.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth speaks during a press briefing at the White House in Washington on Aug. 11, 2025. (Madalina Kilroy/The Epoch Times)
In a subsequent statement, Anthropic said it would challenge the designation in court. “No amount of intimidation or punishment from the Department of War will change our position on mass domestic surveillance or fully autonomous weapons,” it said.
The company added that the law only allowed that designation to impact its AI system Claude’s use in Department of War contracts. “It cannot affect how contractors use Claude to serve other customers,” it said.
Impact of Administration’s Actions
The administration’s decision could have widespread impacts as the Claude bot is extensively deployed across Hegseth’s departments and other American security agencies.
The General Services Administration said on Feb. 27 that it was removing Anthropic from its Multiple Award Schedule. That’s the primary procurement vehicle for the federal government, accounting for over $52.5 billion in sales for fiscal year 2025.
Anthropic indicated the impact would be relatively limited, however, saying that for Department of War contractors, the designation would only impact use of Claude on government work.
President Donald Trump speaks about American energy dominance at the Port of Corpus Christi in Texas on Feb. 27, 2026. (Travis Gillmore/The Epoch Times)
Hegseth said the company would ensure a seamless transition over a six-month period to a “more patriotic provider.”
The future for Anthropic and the Department of War remains unclear, but shortly after Hegseth’s announcement, OpenAI founder Sam Altman said he reached an agreement with the department.
“Two of our most important safety principles are prohibitions on domestic mass surveillance and human responsibility for the use of force, including for autonomous weapon systems,” Altman said on social media.
He added that the department agreed with those principles and that OpenAI “would build technical safeguards to ensure our models behave as they should, which the [Department of War] also wanted.”
Debate Over Safety
Critics, including Democratic lawmakers, criticized the Trump administration over the Anthropic dispute, saying the federal government was demanding too much.
Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-Ga.) said Hegseth should be fired immediately, while Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) said the administration’s conduct should cause concern.
“Trump & Hegseth’s bullying of a company to deploy AI-driven weapons without safeguards should scare the hell out of all of us,” he said on social media. “This is about more than Anthropic – it’s about the responsible deployment of AI everywhere.”
Hegseth, meanwhile, accused the company of delivering “a masterclass in arrogance and betrayal.” The company tried to seize veto power over operational decisions, the war secretary alleged.
A response in Chinese by ChatGPT, an AI chatbot developed by OpenAI, is seen on its website in this illustration picture taken Feb. 9, 2023. (Florence Lo/Illustration/Reuters)
He said that “America’s warfighters will never be held hostage by the ideological whims of Big Tech.”
“This decision is final.”
The president accused the company of endangering national security and being selfish in its disagreement with the terms.
Trump said the company’s officials “have made a DISASTROUS MISTAKE trying to STRONG-ARM the Department of War, and force them to obey their Terms of Service instead of our Constitution.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
