An interesting situation is unfolding around Anthropic. The Trump administration has just blacklisted the company, and now U.S. federal agencies will be unable to use its products. Trump called this a threat to national security, and used quite strong language.

The whole story started with a conflict between Anthropic and the Pentagon. The military wanted full access to Claude, but the company refused. According to Anthropic's leadership, they only insisted on two exceptions — a ban on surveillance of Americans and on the use of autonomous weapons. Seemingly reasonable conditions, but Trump and his team perceived them as insubordination.

What’s especially amusing is that, against the backdrop of this scandal, OpenAI, Anthropic’s main competitor, has already signed a contract with the Department of Defense. And here’s an interesting point: CEO Sam Altman claims that OpenAI agreed to the same conditions that Anthropic proposed. It turns out that the issue isn’t about the conditions themselves, but something else.

Defense Secretary Hegseth hinted that Anthropic is now banned for anyone working with the U.S. military. But the company itself denied this, citing applicable legislation. Of course, fully understanding this situation is difficult, but it looks like a pure political game. Trump is pressuring Anthropic, OpenAI gets the contract, and everyone is happy. It will be interesting to see how this impacts the development of the AI industry as a whole.