Anthropic digs in on AI standoff with the Pentagon

Anthropic delivered a blunt message for the Pentagon: Thanks, but no thanks.

The AI start-up late Thursday rebuffed the Defense Department's latest offer to resolve a standoff over deploying Anthropic's Claude AI system for military purposes without restrictions. The Pentagon had imposed a 5:01 p.m. Friday deadline for Anthropic to yield to its demands, or face retaliation from the Trump administration.

At stake is a $200 million defense contract between Anthropic and the Pentagon around the use of AI in classified military systems. Anthropic has pressed for assurances its AI won't be engaged in mass surveillance of Americans or used in autonomous weapons systems without human oversight. The company has dug in against repeated demands from the Defense Department that its technology must be applied as the Pentagon sees fit militarily while complying with the law.

"These threats do not change our position: we cannot in good conscience accede to their request," Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said in a Thursday statement posted on the company's website.

Both sides are barreling toward the deadline with few signs of progress. Still, there appears to be an opening for a last-minute breakthrough with hours to go.

Emil Michael, the Pentagon's top technology officer, told Bloomberg News on Friday morning that "up until that deadline, I’m open to more talks."

That was a sharp change from the antagonistic tone he had taken only a day earlier. On Thursday, Michael bashed Amodei as "a liar" with a "God complex" in a social media post.

He added the Pentagon will comply with the law but "not bend to whims of any one for-profit tech company."

The Defense Department has threatened to label Anthropic as a "supply chain" risk, a move usually reserved for foreign rivals that could sever the company from U.S. government contracts. It has also warned it may invoke the Defense Production Act (DPA), an extraordinary step that would allow the U.S. government to commandeer the company's AI technology.

Analysts have pointed to a contradiction in the Trump administration's hardline approach to the company. Labeling Anthropic as a supply chain risk would bar the government from using its products. Yet invoking the Defense Production Act would allow it to claim Anthropic's AI model is essential to national security.

Amodei echoed that point in his statement on Thursday, calling the threats "inherently contradictory."

"One labels us a security risk," he said. "The other labels Claude as essential to national security."

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman backed up Anthropic in its standoff with the Pentagon, a sign that the Trump administration might have to deal with the same concerns from other AI companies about the use of cutting-edge AI technology.

"I don’t personally think that the Pentagon should be threatening DPA against these companies," Altman said in a CNBC interview on Friday. "For all the differences I have with Anthropic, I mostly trust them as a company and I think they really do care about safety. I'm not sure where this is going to go."