Judge says Anthropic AI-ban case has gotten worse for US

US District Judge Rita F. Lin says the government's case for banning Anthropic as a supply-chain threat has gotten worse, not better. She said so at a July 30 hearing, months after temporarily blocking the designation in March.

Anthropic was labeled a supply-chain threat, a designation that can strip contracts from the company and from anyone doing business with it. Lin is now weighing whether to make her March block of that designation permanent.

The government's argument, per Bloomberg's report on the hearing, leans on Anthropic's public criticism of the Department of Defense as justification for the ban. Lin called that reasoning "really troubling." She also said the administration still hasn't produced evidence justifying the designation in the first place.

She warned it would let the government brand any contractor that criticizes it publicly as "an enemy of the state." That label alone, she said, could be used to cut off the contractor's business entirely.