Anthropic is suing the Trump administration for what it calls an “unlawful campaign of retaliation” against the artificial intelligence company over its refusal to allow unrestricted military use of its technology.
Anthropic asked federal courts on Monday to reverse the Pentagon’s decision last week to designate the artificial intelligence company a “ supply chain risk.” The company also seeks to undo President Donald Trump's order directing federal employees to stop using its AI chatbot Claude.
The legal challenge intensifies an unusually public dispute over how AI can be used in warfare and mass surveillance — one that has also dragged in Anthropic's tech industry rivals, particularly OpenAI, which made its own deal to work with the Pentagon just hours after the government punished Anthropic for its stance.
Anthropic filed two separate lawsuits Monday, one in California federal court and another in the federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., each challenging different aspects of the government's actions against the company.
“These actions are unprecedented and unlawful," Anthropic's lawsuit says. "The Constitution does not allow the government to wield its enormous power to punish a company for its protected speech. No federal statute authorizes the actions taken here. Anthropic turns to the judiciary as a last resort to vindicate its rights and halt the Executive’s unlawful campaign of retaliation.”
The Defense Department declined to comment Monday, citing a policy of not commenting on matters in litigation.
Anthropic said it sought to restrict its technology from being used for two high-level usages: mass surveillance of Americans and fully autonomous weapons. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and other officials publicly insisted the company must accept “all lawful" uses of Claude and threatened punishment if Anthropic did not comply.
Designating the company a supply chain risk cuts off Anthropic's defense work using an authority that was designed to prevent foreign adversaries from harming national security systems. It was the first time the federal government is known to have used the designation against a U.S. company.
President Donald Trump also said he would order federal agencies to stop using Claude, though he gave the Pentagon six months to phase out a product that’s deeply embedded in classified military systems, including those used in the Iran war.
Anthropic's lawsuit also names other federal agencies, including the departments of Treasury and State, after officials ordered employees to stop using Anthropic’s services.
Even as it fights the Pentagon’s actions, Anthropic has sought to convince businesses and other government agencies that the Trump administration’s penalty is a narrow one that only affects military contractors when they are using Claude in work for the Department of Defense.
Making that distinction clear is crucial for the privately held Anthropic because most of its projected $14 billion in revenue this year comes from businesses and government agencies that are using Claude for computer coding and other tasks. More than 500 customers are paying Anthropic at least $1 million annually for Claude, according to a recent investment announcement valued the company at $380 billion.
Anthropic said in a statement Monday that “seeking judicial review does not change our longstanding commitment to harnessing AI to protect our national security, but this is a necessary step to protect our business, our customers, and our partners."
FILE- Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, left, and Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Emil Michael, right, arrive to look at a display of multi-domain autonomous systems in the Pentagon courtyard, Wednesday, July 16, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)
FILE - Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stands outside the Pentagon during a welcome ceremony for the Japanese defense minister at the Pentagon in Washington, Jan. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Kevin Wolf, File)
Pages from the Anthropic website and the company's logos are displayed on a computer screen in New York on Thursday, Feb. 26, 2026. (AP Photo/Patrick Sison)
NEW YORK (AP) — Two men who brought explosives to a protest outside New York City's mayoral mansion said they were inspired by the Islamic State extremist group, a court complaint said.
Emir Balat and Ibrahim Kayumi are awaiting arraignment Monday on charges of attempting to provide material support to a terrorist organization and using a weapon of mass destruction.
Kayumi blurted out, as he was being arrested Saturday, that “ISIS” was the reason for his conduct, the complaint said. Balat, 18, later told authorities that he had pledged allegiance to the extremist group, and Kayumi, 19, asserted that he was affiliated with the Islamic State group, the complaint said.
Officers asked Balat whether he was aiming to accomplish something akin to the bombing of the Boston Marathon in 2013, when when two pressure-cooker bombs exploded near the finish line, killing three people and wounding hundreds more.
“No, even bigger,” Balat replied, according to the complaint.
The men's attorneys were expected at court. Attempts to reach the suspects' families were not immediately successful.
The homemade devices, which did not explode, were hurled Saturday during raucous counterprotests against an anti-Islamic demonstration led by Jake Lang, a far-right activist and critic of New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a Democrat and the first Muslim to hold the office. Mamdani and his wife weren't at the house, called Gracie Mansion, at the time.
Speaking outside the residence Monday morning, Mamdani said Balat and Kayumi “traveled from Pennsylvania and attempted to bring violence to New York City.”
Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said there are no indications that the men’s alleged activities were connected to the ongoing war in Iran. She declined to say more about why authorities believe the suspects were motivated by the Islamic State group, a Sunni extremist group. Iran’s population is almost entirely Shiite, the other main religious community within Islam.
While Mamdani and Tisch briefed reporters Monday, Lang heckled from outside the Gracie Mansion gates.
Meanwhile, police searched a home in northeastern Pennsylvania’s Middletown Township, and a separate federal investigation was underway in nearby Newtown, local police said. Both inquiries were related to the incident outside New York’s mayoral residence, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, a Pennsylvania Republican, wrote in a social media post Sunday.
Lang's sparsely attended protest Saturday drew a far larger group of counterdemonstrators, including one person who police say tossed a smoking object containing nuts, bolts, screws and a “hobby fuse” into the crowd.
The device extinguished itself steps from police officers, Tisch noted. The same person who threw it then dropped a second device that did not appear to ignite, the commissioner said.
The scene had grown chaotic even before the devices were thrown. Police said one person involved in the anti-Islam protest, Ian McGinnis, 21, was arrested after pepper-spraying counterprotesters. McGinnis, of Philadelphia, was released without bond after pleading not guilty Sunday to assault and aggravated harassment in a New York court, records show. A message seeking comment was left Monday for his attorney.
Three others were taken into custody but were released without charges.
After the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, Lang was charged with assaulting an officer with a baseball bat, civil disorder and other crimes. He was later freed from prison as part of President Donald Trump’s sweeping act of clemency. Lang recently announced that he is running for U.S. Senate in Florida.
Earlier this year, he organized a rally in Minneapolis in support of Trump’s immigration crackdown, drawing an angry crowd of counterprotesters who quickly chased him away.
This story has been corrected to reflect that police are now identifying one of the suspects by the name Ibrahim Kayumi, instead of Ibrahim Nikks. Earlier headlines were corrected to show Tisch referred to the possibility of the suspects being inspired by rather than related to the Islamic State group.
Associated Press writers Jennifer Peltz in New York and David Collins in Hartford, Connecticut, contributed.
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a news conference at Gracie Mansion, Monday, March 9, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani, left, walks out of Gracie Mansion with New York Police commissioner Jessica Tisch, second from left, to make an address at a news conference, Monday, March 9, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
New York Police commissioner Jessica Tisch speaks during a news conference with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani at Gracie Mansion, Monday, March 9, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
Jake Lang demonstrates outside Gracie Mansion after a news conference by New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani , Monday, March 9, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
In this image taken from video, law enforcement officers respond to Manhattan's Upper East Side as New York City's police said they had identified a "suspicious device in a vehicle,” Sunday, March 8, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Joseph B. Frederick)
Jake Lang shouts from a sidewalk as New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a news conference at Gracie Mansion, Monday, March 9, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
New York Police commissioner Jessica Tisch speaks during a news conference with New York Mayor Zohran Mamdani at Gracie Mansion, Monday, March 9, 2026, in New York. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
