Anthropic refused to allow the US military to use its Claude model for fully autonomous lethal weapons or for the mass surveillance of Americans.
A U.S. federal judge ruled Thursday that sanctions imposed by the Trump administration against AI giant Anthropic were illegal, finding that the government punished the company in a dispute over military use of its technology.
Anthropic infuriated Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth in February by insisting its technology should not be used for mass surveillance or fully autonomous weapons systems.
President Donald Trump, in response, ordered every government agency to stop using Anthropic's products, while Hegseth labeled the company a "supply chain risk" to national security.
"The empty invocation of national security is not a blank check to punish and retaliate against government critics," Judge Rita Lin said in a 59-page decision seen by AFP.
