Anthropic says latest Pentagon contract doesn’t bar AI use for autonomous weapons, domestic surveillance

As the clock ticks towards a 5:00 p.m. ET deadline for Anthropic to agree to a deal with the Pentagon, both sides are digging in.

The AI company’s CEO has made clear that despite threats from the Pentagon, they refuse to drop their two key demands: no use of its artificial intelligence for fully autonomous weapons — meaning AI, not humans, making final battlefield targeting decisions — and no mass domestic surveillance.

Anthropic told ABC News that amid negotiations, the latest contract language from the Pentagon does not fully commit that the military will not use their technology for those two use cases.

In fact, Anthropic said the “new language” added into the contract by the department would allow their safeguards to be “disregarded at will.”

“The contract language we received 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 told ABC News.

The company added, “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.”

Top members of the Senate Armed Services Committee have sent a private letter to Anthropic and the Pentagon, urging them to resolve their fight.

The Senate leaders are urging Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and the CEO of Anthropic, Dario Amodei, to extend their negotiations and work with Congress to find a solution, according to the letter obtained by ABC News.

The Pentagon claims it has no intention of using Anthropic’s AI for cases that involve mass domestic surveillance or autonomous kinetic operations. However, it says Anthropic’s guardrails could jeopardize military operations.

The Pentagon said that if Anthropic does not agree to its demands by 5:00 p.m. ET Friday, they will terminate the partnership with Anthropic and label the company a “supply chain risk” – a designation usually reserved for foreign adversaries.

“The Department has stated that it does not intend to conduct mass surveillance or use autonomous weapons without humans on the loop — positions that we in Congress endorse,” the letter from the Senate leaders reads. “It is clear, however, that the issue of ‘lawful use’ requires additional work by all stakeholders. We must determine whether additional legislative or regulatory language is required, and, if so, what that law and regulation should entail.”

“By Friday, February 27, the DOD could essentially declare war not on a foreign nation but on one of America’s most successful frontier AI companies if it does not bow to its demands,” Adam Conner, the vice president for technology policy at American Progress, wrote in an article on their website.

“This would be an unprecedented and unnecessary peacetime move that sends the signal to other private companies that they must do the Trump administration’s bidding or face existential consequences,” Conner wrote.