The Trump administration’s retribution campaign has landed in court again, this time with a lawsuit from Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company behind the AI tool Claude.
The company said the government unlawfully retaliated by deeming Anthropic a national security supply-chain risk. The company said that happened because it maintained Claude can’t, as it said in its legal complaint, “safely or reliably be used for autonomous lethal warfare and mass surveillance of Americans.”
The complaint was filed Monday in the federal Northern District of California, where the San Francisco-based company is headquartered.
It recounted that President Donald Trump, on Feb. 27, directed all federal agencies to “IMMEDIATELY CEASE all use of Anthropic’s technology.” That same day, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered that the company be designated a “Supply-Chain Risk to National Security,” adding that “no contractor, supplier, or partner that does business with the United States military may conduct any commercial activity with Anthropic.” Other agencies followed suit.
Calling the actions “unprecedented and unlawful,” Anthropic accused the administration of “pure retaliation” and said the Constitution doesn’t allow the government to “wield its enormous power to punish a company for its protected speech.” The company said it’s turning to the courts “as a last resort to vindicate its rights and halt the Executive’s unlawful campaign of retaliation.”
Alleging violations of the Administrative Procedure Act and constitutional provisions, including the First Amendment, Anthropic is seeking urgent relief against the administration. The company said the actions of Trump, Hegseth and other agencies “will continue to impair Anthropic’s First Amendment and due process rights, injure its reputation, harm its business relationships, and cause economic injury for which it cannot obtain compensation from the government.”
The company separately filed a petition in Washington’s federal appeals court, seeking review of Hegseth’s directive.
The government will have an opportunity to respond in court. The California suit was assigned to Biden-appointed Judge Rita Lin.
Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal Newsletter for expert analysis on the top legal stories of the week, including updates from the Supreme Court and developments in the Trump administration’s legal cases.
