Anthropic is suing the Trump administration, asking federal courts to reverse the Pentagon’s decision designating the artificial intelligence company a “supply chain risk” over its refusal to allow unrestricted military use of its technology.

Until this week, Anthropic was the only AI company cleared to deploy its models on classified networks. Elon Musk's xAI is now the second.

The company's Claude chatbot is one of the few AI systems cleared for use in classified settings. But a standoff between Anthropic and the Trump administration is putting its government work at risk.

The artificial intelligence company filed two lawsuits against the Department of Defense, saying it was being punished on ideological grounds.

Anthropic filed a lawsuit on Monday to block the Pentagon from placing it on a national security blacklist.

The Information Technology Industry Council's letter doesn't name Anthropic, but lands days after the AI company was designated a supply chain risk.

Pete Hegseth gave Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei until Friday to grant the Pentagon unrestricted access to Claude or face losing its defence contract and a government blacklist designation.

Anthropic just took its fight with the Trump administration to federal court. The AI firm sued on Monday after the Pentagon branded the company a security risk and moved to cancel its government contracts,

The Pentagon said Anthropic and its Claude AI model are no longer welcome, letting OpenAI and Grok fill the gap in DOD classified systems.

US defence secretary Pete Hegseth has threatened to cut Anthropic from his department’s supply chain unless it agrees to sign off on its technology being used in all lawful military applications by Friday.