Anthropic has asked a U.S. appeals court to reconsider a ruling upholding the Pentagon's supply-chain risk label, which bars defense contractors from using its AI models.
In a petition filed Tuesday, Anthropic claimed that the court misread the law and overlooked evidence indicating that the Pentagon's designation was retaliation for Anthropic's public stance on AI safety.
The company is challenging a Sept. 25 ruling, in which the appeals court voted 2-1 to uphold the Defense Department's February decision to designate Anthropic a "national security supply-chain risk."
Specifically, Anthropic argued that the ruling did not credit Secretary of War Pete Hegseth's accusation that Anthropic had subversive intent.
"Instead, it incorrectly read 41 U.S.C. § 4713 to permit the Secretary to designate Anthropic a national-security risk based on pre-deployment model training-a feature of all AI models," Anthropic said in the filing. "And it did so without any pre-designation process, and despite straightforward evidence the designation was retaliation for Anthropic’s speech about AI safety."
Anthropic also argued that the previous court majority "transformed a statute aimed at hostile foreign actors into one that presumptively reaches every government contractor."
Pentagon also moved to end its use of Anthropic's AI models. A Pentagon official told the BBC last week that the department had "ceased the use of Anthropic products," roughly two years after the U.S. government and military began using the company's tools in 2024.
Anthropic has said that the blacklisting could reduce its 2026 revenue by billions of dollars, according to Reuters.
The Pentagon's move came even as relations between President Donald Trump and Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei appear to have warmed. Last month, Amodei - who has kept sounding alarms about AI risks - told reporters at the White House that working with the president would let them "win safely." Trump also called Amodei "great" and "fantastic."
The Latent has reached out to Anthropic and the Defense Department for comment.