Trump orders federal agencies to drop Anthropic over AI safeguard dispute

President Donald Trump has ordered all federal agencies to stop using Claude and other Anthropic products, escalating a heated standoff between the Department of Defense and the AI company over its usage restrictions. The order was posted Friday on Truth Social and gives government agencies, including the Department of War (formerly Defense), six months to migrate to alternative solutions.

"The Leftwing nut jobs at Anthropic 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 president wrote. "Anthropic better get their act together, and be helpful during this phase out period, or I will use the Full Power of the Presidency to make them comply, with major civil and criminal consequences to follow."

Before Trump's post, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth had already threatened to label Anthropic a "supply chain risk" if the company refused to remove restrictions preventing Claude from being used for mass surveillance of American citizens or in fully autonomous weapons systems.

Following Trump's statement, Hegseth posted on X saying he was "directing the Department of War to designate Anthropic a Supply-Chain Risk to National Security." He added that effective immediately, no contractor, supplier, or partner doing business with the US military may conduct any commercial activity with Anthropic.

Anthropic had already signaled before the presidential order that negotiations with the Department of War had effectively stalled. A company spokesperson said the contract received after CEO Dario Amodei laid out Anthropic's position made "virtually no progress" on preventing the outlined misuses.

The spokesperson said:

"New language framed as a compromise was paired with legalese that would allow those safeguards to be disregarded at will. Despite DOW's recent public statements, these narrow safeguards have been the crux of our negotiations for months. We remain ready to continue talks and committed to operational continuity for the Department and America's warfighters."

Advocacy groups were quick to push back. Center for Democracy and Technology (CDT) President and CEO Alexandra Givens called the situation a dangerous precedent:

"This action sets a dangerous precedent. It chills private companies' ability to engage frankly with the government about appropriate uses of their technology, which is especially important in national security settings that so often have reduced public visibility."

"These threats undermine the integrity of the innovation ecosystem, distort market incentives and normalize an expansive view of executive power that should worry Americans all across the political spectrum."

For now, the AI industry appears to be rallying behind Anthropic. On Friday, hundreds of Google and OpenAI employees signed an open letter urging their companies to stand in "solidarity" with the lab.

According to an internal memo seen by Axios, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the company would draw the same red lines as Anthropic.

Late Friday, Anthropic published a blog post vowing to "challenge any supply chain risk designation in court" and assured customers that only work tied to the Department of Defense would be affected.

The company's statement reads:

"Designating Anthropic as a supply chain risk would be an unprecedented action—one historically reserved for US adversaries, never before publicly applied to an American company. We are deeply saddened by these developments."

"As the first frontier AI company to deploy models in the US government's classified networks, Anthropic has supported American warfighters since June 2024 and has every intention of continuing to do so."

"We believe this designation would both be legally unsound and set a dangerous precedent for any American company that negotiates with the government."

"No amount of intimidation or punishment from the Department of War will change our position on mass domestic surveillance or fully autonomous weapons. We will challenge any supply chain risk designation in court."

It's not entirely clear how far the Trump administration and the Department of War can legally push a private company to abandon its own principles. Trump's invocation of the Constitution in his post carries more rhetorical weight than legal substance.

Senator Mark Warner has pointed out that Trump and Hegseth's actions may be a pretext for redirecting contracts toward a preferred vendor, and warned of risks to both US defense readiness and the private sector's willingness to work with the government. If this goes to court, the real legal battle will center on the Defense Production Act and the "supply chain risk" designation – not the Constitution.