Judge rules Trump administration illegally punished AI firm Anthropic

Updated on: August 28, 2026 / 8:20 AM EDT / CBS News

A judge late Thursday permanently barred the Trump administration from enforcing a set of rules aimed at cutting off Anthropic from the federal government, ruling the administration had unconstitutionally punished the artificial intelligence company for protected speech.

The ruling marks a victory for Anthropic in its monthslong legal battle against the administration over its push to impose guardrails on its powerful AI model Claude, which is used by the military. Anthropic sought to prevent Claude from being used for mass surveillance or fully autonomous weapons, but the military argued it should be allowed to use the model for all lawful purposes.

With the two sides unable to reach a deal, President Trump ordered federal agencies to stop using Claude earlier this year, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth declared the firm a supply chain risk, aiming to prevent private defense contractors from using it to do work for the military. The administration argued those moves were necessary to safeguard national security.

In her ruling Thursday, U.S. District Judge Rita Lin of San Francisco declared that those actions violated the First Amendment by punishing it for disagreeing with the government…

Original source: https://www.cbsnews.com/moneywatch/