US judge rules Trump administration’s blacklisting of Anthropic illegal

A US federal judge ruled Thursday that the Trump administration acted illegally when it designated AI company Anthropic a security risk and barred the company from working with the US government, The New York Times reported.

Judge Rita Lin of the US District Court for the Northern District of California said the government had unlawfully retaliated against Anthropic “for constitutionally protected expressive activities” after the company spoke publicly about how its technology should be used.

“The empty invocation of national security is not a blank check to punish and retaliate against government critics,” Lin wrote in her 59-page ruling.

Anthropic said it was “pleased the court has ruled that this supply-chain-risk designation was unlawful.”

“We remain focused on working productively with the government to harness AI for our national security so all Americans benefit from this technology,” the company said.

The Trump administration did not immediately respond to a request for comment, according to the report.

The ruling concerns one of two lawsuits Anthropic filed in March challenging the administration's designation.

The second lawsuit, filed in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, remains ongoing.

The administration could reportedly appeal Lin's ruling or wait for a decision in the second case before taking further action.

The dispute followed a disagreement between Anthropic and the Pentagon over a $200 million contract to provide AI technology for classified systems.

Anthropic had insisted that its technology not be used for mass surveillance of Americans or autonomous lethal weapons.

The Pentagon said a private company could not establish policy for the US government.

After the two sides failed to reach an agreement, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth designated Anthropic a “supply chain risk.”

The designation meant that contractors and suppliers working with the military could not do business with Anthropic.

Anthropic filed two lawsuits on March 9, arguing that the statutes governing supply-chain-risk designations were narrow and did not apply to US companies.

The company also argued that the designation was intended to penalize it for its views and violated its First Amendment rights.

Before issuing her ruling, Lin had described the Pentagon's argument that Anthropic's public criticism of the government justified barring the company from federal work as “really troubling.”

She also said she had seen no evidence supporting the government's claims that Anthropic could “flip some kind of kill switch” to disable or alter its AI models during a war.