Anthropic says Pentagon's "final offer" is unacceptable

Anthropic on Thursday said there has been "virtually no progress" on negotiations with the Pentagon, as CEO Dario Amodei said it could not accept what defense officials had labeled their final offer on AI safeguards.

Why it matters: A deadline of Friday at 5:01pm is fast approaching for Anthropic to let the Pentagon use its model Claude as it sees fit or potentially face severe consequences.


What they're saying: "The contract language we received overnight from the Department of War made virtually no progress on preventing Claude's use for mass surveillance of Americans or in fully autonomous weapons," Anthropic said in a statement.

"New language framed as compromise was paired with legalese that would allow those safeguards to be disregarded at will. Despite
DOW's recent public statements, these narrow safeguards have been the crux of our negotiations for months."

Anthropic is not walking away from the table, even as significant gaps remain with less than 24 hours before the deadline. While the company said it expects further negotiations, a rupture appeared close.

Emil Michael, the Pentagon official handling negotiations with Anthropic, denounced Amodei as a "liar" with a "God complex" who was "putting our nation's safety at risk."

https://www.axios.com/2026/02/26/anthropic-rejects-pentagon-ai-terms