Trump DOJ Files Court Defense of Anthropic Pentagon Blacklisting: 'Refusal to Remove Guardrails Is Conduct, Not Protected Speech'

US News / Reuters·high signal

The Trump administration submitted its legal response on March 17 defending the Pentagon's supply-chain-risk designation of Anthropic. The DOJ argued the action was triggered by Anthropic's refusal to remove guardrails against autonomous weapons and domestic surveillance use — framing that refusal as 'conduct, not protected speech' to sidestep First Amendment claims. Former federal judges filed an amicus brief the same day siding with Anthropic, escalating the case's significance as a constitutional test for AI governance.