A district court judge ruled on Thursday on the legal battle between Anthropic, an artificial intelligence safety and research company, and the Department of War.
The court ruled in favor of Anthropic and against the War Department, following the company’s March lawsuit objecting to the War Department’s supply chain designation of Anthropic and categorizing it as a national security risk. The designation prohibited Anthropic from working with the U.S. government and restricted companies that worked with the U.S. military from working with Anthropic.
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“For the reasons set forth in the accompanying Opinion (Dkt. No. 250), it is hereby ORDERED that Anthropic’s motion for summary judgment is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART and Defendants’ motion for summary judgment is GRANTED IN PART and DENIED IN PART as follows,” read the official court documents.
Judge Rita Lin of the U.S. District Court in the Northern District of California ruled that the War Department’s actions violated Anthropic’s First Amendment rights and the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment. Regarding the First Amendment violations, the court ruled that the War Department’s actions were illegal because they were “unlawful retaliation against Anthropic for constitutionally protected expressive activities.” Pertaining to the Fifth Amendment violations, Lin ruled that the War Department deprived “Anthropic of constitutionally protected liberty interests without sufficient pre-deprivation notice or opportunity to be heard.”
Additionally, Lin ruled that the “Supply Chain Designation” that Anthropic objected to was “arbitrary, capricious, and in excess of statutory jurisdiction, authority, or limitations” under a federal law statute and without “observance of procedure required by law.” Moreover, War Secretary Pete Hegseth’s directive, which prohibited contractors, partners, suppliers, or any company that “does business with the United States military” from collaborating with Anthropic, was ruled illegal and ordered “vacated.”
Lin ordered the supply chain designation to be vacated in her ruling and declared that the actions taken by the War Department and other agencies in the Trump administration were done so “without authorization by law.” They were also ordered vacated.
The court largely objected to the War Department’s reasoning for giving Anthropic the designation, claiming it was done as a form of retaliation rather than a genuine national security concern.
“The government is certainly owed deference on weighty issues of national security,” said Lin. “But Defendants’ contemporaneous words and deeds confirm that the challenged actions were based on a desire to make a public example out of Anthropic for its “arrogance” in criticizing the government, not based on any articulable basis to believe that Anthropic would actually sabotage its model.”
Lin noted the Trump administration’s inconsistencies in collaborating with Anthropic. She highlighted that they sought to designate Anthropic a national security threat but were still working to collaborate with the company on its most recent artificial intelligence product, Mythos.
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“Even now, the government is discussing collaboration with Anthropic on its new model, Mythos, in an array of sensitive contexts,” Lin said. “None of that is consistent with a genuine fear that Anthropic is a saboteur who would poison its software to harm national security.”
“The undisputed record shows that the challenged actions constituted unlawful retaliation in violation of the First Amendment, and that Anthropic was denied the pre-deprivation process required under the Fifth Amendment,” Lin said.
“Though the Department of War is undisputedly free to select the AI vendor of its choice, the evidence demonstrates that the broad measures imposed on Anthropic were illegal and baseless,” she added.
