Donald Trump has ordered the US government to cease all dealings with Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company, escalating a dispute over the technology’s potential military applications and sparking concerns about the future of AI regulation. The move, announced Friday, came after the Pentagon accused Anthropic of “arrogance and betrayal” in negotiations over access to its AI models.
The conflict centers on the Pentagon’s demand for assurances regarding the use of Anthropic’s AI, specifically preventing its deployment in “domestic mass surveillance and autonomously killing people without human oversight,” according to an open letter signed by hundreds of employees from Google DeepMind and OpenAI. US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth stated that Anthropic would be designated a supply chain risk, effectively barring any military contractor or partner from doing business with the firm. “Effective immediately, no contractor, supplier, or partner that does business with the United States military may conduct any commercial activity with Anthropic,” Hegseth wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
The Pentagon had initially given Anthropic until 5:01 PM Friday to comply with its demands or face compulsion under the Defense Production Act, a Cold War-era law granting the federal government broad authority to direct private industry in support of national security. The law was last invoked during the Covid-19 pandemic to accelerate vaccine production. According to legal experts, the Defense Production Act’s applicability to this situation is debatable, with some arguing its powers may be limited in regulating the ethical constraints of AI development.
Anthropic did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The company had reportedly sought safeguards similar to those proposed by OpenAI, whose chief executive Sam Altman told employees he was also seeking an agreement with the Pentagon that would include restrictions on the use of AI for surveillance and autonomous weapons systems. “We have long believed that AI should not be used for mass surveillance or autonomous lethal weapons, and that humans should remain in the loop for high-stakes automated decisions,” Altman wrote in a memo to employees, as reported by US media.
The Centre for Democracy and Technology (CDT) sharply criticized Trump’s action, arguing it sets a “dangerous precedent” and “chills private companies’ ability to engage frankly with the Government about appropriate uses of their technology.” CDT chief Alexandra Givens stated that the President was “wielding the full weight of the federal government to blacklist a company for taking a narrowly-tailored, principled stance to restrict some of the most extreme uses of AI you could imagine.”
The dispute highlights growing tensions between the US government and AI developers over the ethical and security implications of increasingly powerful AI models. The Pentagon’s aggressive stance reflects a desire to maintain control over the technology’s application in national security contexts, even as Anthropic and others in the industry are pushing for greater transparency and limitations on potentially harmful uses. As of Saturday, February 28, 2026, Anthropic has not publicly responded to the government’s actions, and the future of negotiations remains uncertain.