{"id":6322,"date":"2026-02-28T07:11:13","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T07:11:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/range\/trump-directs-government-to-immediately-cease-using-anthropic-technology\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T07:11:13","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T07:11:13","slug":"trump-directs-government-to-immediately-cease-using-anthropic-technology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sawahsolutions.com\/range\/trump-directs-government-to-immediately-cease-using-anthropic-technology\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump directs government to \u2018immediately cease\u2019 using Anthropic technology"},"content":{"rendered":"
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President Trump on Friday directed all federal agencies\u2014including the Defense Department\u2014to \u201cimmediately cease all use\u201d of frontier AI firm Anthropic\u2019s technology, though he also said there would be a six-month “phase out period.”<\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s announcement followed a tense back-and-forth between Anthropic and the Pentagon, which widely uses the San Francisco company\u2019s popular AI platform, Claude, in classified and unclassified networks but took issue with the company\u2019s refusal to give the Pentagon unrestricted access to its models.<\/p>\n

In a Thursday statement ahead of the Pentagon\u2019s Friday deadline, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said he would not allow Claude to be used for mass surveillance of U.S. citizens or to guide fully autonomous weapons, an argument Trump framed as trying to \u201cstrong arm\u201d the Defense Department and force it to \u201cobey their terms of service.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI am directing every agency in the United States Government to IMMEDIATELY CEASE all use of Anthropic\u2019s technology,\u201d Trump said in a Truth Social post. \u201cWe don\u2019t need it, we don\u2019t want it, and will not do business with them again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Trump said there would be a six-month \u201cphase-out period\u201d for agencies using Anthropic\u2019s products at various levels, including classified settings and among civilian agencies. Trump threatened Anthropic with punishment should the company refuse to help in the phase-out. As Defense One\u2019s<\/em> Patrick Tucker reported Feb. 26, it may take several months or longer for the government to replace Anthropic\u2019s tools.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnthropic had better get their act together and be helpful during this phase out period, or I will use the full power of my Presidency to make them comply, with major civil and criminal consequences to follow,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

In his own post, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he was ordering his department to \u201cdesignate Anthropic a Supply-Chain Risk to National Security.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Hegseth did not explain why a supply-chain risk would be permitted to operate in classified networks for up to six more months.<\/p>\n

Amodei had noted this \u201ccontradictory\u201d action in his Thursday statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have threatened to remove us from their systems if we maintain these safeguards; they have also threatened to designate us a \u2018supply chain risk\u2019\u2014a label reserved for US adversaries, never before applied to an American company\u2014and to invoke the Defense Production Act to force the safeguards\u2019 removal. These latter two threats are inherently contradictory: one labels us a security risk; the other labels Claude as essential to national security.\u201d<\/p>\n

Founded in 2021, Anthropic has developed models and tools that are already widely used across the federal government, largely through its partnership with leading cloud provider Amazon Web Services, through which it first gained a foothold in the Defense Department and intelligence agencies. Anthropic, along with xAI, Google and OpenAI, received $200 million defense contracts last July to bolster the Pentagon\u2019s push to harness AI.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the General Services Administration, which manages hundreds of billions of dollars\u2019 worth of contracts on behalf of all agencies, said in a statement Friday it would remove Anthropic from its Multiple Award\u00a0Schedule and USAI.gov.\u00a0Federal Acquisition Services Commissioner Josh Gruenbaum tweeted that GSA has terminated Anthropic’s OneGov deal, ending the availability of those contracts\u00a0across the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cGSA stands with the President in rejecting attempts to politicize work dedicated to America\u2019s national security,\u201d GSA Administrator Edward C. Forst said in a statement. \u201cBuilding resilient, secure, and scalable AI solutions demands alignment, trust, and a willingness to make hard calls. We\u2019re committed to delivering results for Americans, and working with our AI industry partners who fit the bill.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rhetoric used by Trump, Hegseth, Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell, and Defense Undersecretary for Research and Engineering Emil Michael was notable for its stridency.<\/p>\n

Hegseth posted: \u201c…@AnthropicAI and its CEO @DarioAmodei, have chosen duplicity. Cloaked in the sanctimonious rhetoric of \u2018effective altruism,\u2019 they have attempted to strong-arm the United States military into submission – a cowardly act of corporate virtue-signaling that places Silicon Valley ideology above American lives…\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Michael posted, \u201c…It\u2019s a shame that @DarioAmodei is a liar and has a God-complex. He wants nothing more than to try to personally control the US Military and is ok putting our nation\u2019s safety at risk…\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

And yesterday, Parnell posted that DOD only seeks the ability to \u201cuse Anthropic’s model for all lawful purposes,\u201d adding that the idea that the Pentagon wants fully autonomous weapons or mass surveillance is a false narrative \u201cpeddled by leftists in the media.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But in his statement, Amodei said those are the only two limits he insists on.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In \u201ca narrow set of cases, we believe AI can undermine, rather than defend, democratic values. Some uses are also simply outside the bounds of what today\u2019s technology can safely and reliably do,\u201d he said in his statement.<\/p>\n

In a statement, Anthropic said it has “not yet received direct communication from the Department of War or the White House on the status of our negotiations.”<\/p>\n

“We have tried in good faith to reach an agreement with the Department of War, making clear that we support all lawful uses of AI for national security aside from the two narrow exceptions above,” the company said. “To the best of our knowledge, these exceptions have not affected a single government mission to date.”<\/p>\n

Editor’s note: This story was updated to include a statement from Anthropic.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Bradley Peniston contributed to this report.<\/em>\n\n<\/svg><\/p>\n<\/div>\n