US judge rules Trump sanctions against Anthropic illegal

A US federal judge has ruled that the Trump administration's sanctions against AI company Anthropic were illegal. According to SiliconANGLE, the dispute began in 2025 when the Defense Department approached Anthropic about using its AI model, Claude, on an internal platform. The government objected to a clause in Anthropic's terms of use that prohibited using Claude for mass surveillance of Americans or building autonomous weapons.

The judge, Rita Lin, found that the government's actions were "arbitrary and capricious" and constituted unlawful retaliation against Anthropic for its stance on the use of its technology, Computerworld reports. The judge dismissed the Defense Department's core legal arguments, including an allegation that Anthropic had "backdoor access" to its technology, which US officials later acknowledged was not true.

The ruling overturned the government's ban on Anthropic's AI models and designation of the company as a supply chain risk to national security. Ars Technica Policy and Ars Technica both reported that the judge granted key portions of Anthropic's motion for summary judgment, finding that the government's actions violated the First Amendment.

Brief written by urgent.news from Punch Nigeria, SiliconANGLE, Computerworld, Ars Technica Policy, Ars Technica — 5 reports on this story. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.