The tech firm was blacklisted for resisting the US War Departmentâs demand to lift limits on surveillance and autonomous weapons
Artificial intelligence developer Anthropic has filed a lawsuit against the Pentagon and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth, challenging the Trump administrationâs decision to designate the company a national security risk and blacklist its technology across the federal government.
The complaint, filed Monday in the US District Court for the Northern District of California, argues that the administration exceeded its legal authority and retaliated against the company for refusing to remove safeguards governing how its artificial intelligence systems can be used by the military.
Anthropic is asking the court to declare the governmentâs actions unlawful and block the measures, which it says threaten to cause âirreparableâ harm to one of the worldâs âfastest-growingâ and most âresponsibleâ AI companies.
The legal battle stems from the companyâs alleged refusal to lift restrictions preventing its models from being used for mass domestic surveillance or fully autonomous weapons.
On February 27, President Donald Trump ordered federal agencies to stop using Anthropicâs technology, accusing it of being run by âleftwing nut jobs.â Soon afterward, Hegseth formally designated the company a âsupply-chain risk to national security,â a label normally reserved for firms linked to foreign adversaries.
The government has argued that the companyâs refusal to modify its models so they can be used for âall lawful military purposesâ poses operational risks by giving a private contractor leverage over battlefield decision-making. Anthropicâs lawsuit disputes that characterization, saying the administrationâs actions amount to punitive retaliation over a policy disagreement about AI governance.
The company had previously been the only AI developer authorized to deploy large language models on classified Pentagon networks, where its Claude system supported intelligence analysis and operational planning under contracts worth up to $200 million.
Claude also reportedly played a key role in planning and conducting the raid targeting Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro â as well as the US-Israeli strikes on Iran launched mere hours after Trump blacklisted the company.
Under the administrationâs order, federal agencies were instructed to phase out the technology within six months while transitioning to alternative AI providers. Anthropic said the continued reliance on its systems during that period undermines the governmentâs claim that the company represents an immediate security threat.
