The Trump administration is closing the loop on a classified contract that will let US intelligence agencies, the NSA chief among them, tap into Anthropic’s AI models. The deal includes access to Anthropic’s newly developed Mythos model, with one critical guardrail: the technology cannot be used on data pertaining to US citizens.
From blacklisted to back in business
In February 2026, President Trump issued an order for an immediate cessation of all federal use of Anthropic’s technology. The reason was straightforward: Anthropic refused to give the Pentagon unrestricted access to its AI systems. The Pentagon designated Anthropic as a supply chain risk.
Anthropic’s Claude AI models had already been deployed across US government networks at that point. The company had received over $8 billion in funding from Amazon. Cutting it off created real operational gaps.
Those gaps got worse thanks to ongoing chip shortages that have constrained spy agencies’ ability to effectively run advanced AI models. White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles authorized the NSA to continue using Anthropic’s models on an interim basis while negotiations over a new contract played out.
