Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei looks on during a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron at the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi on February 19, 2026.
Ludovic Marin | AFP | Getty Images
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has returned to the negotiating table with the Pentagon after negotiations broke down on Friday over the military’s use of the company’s AI tools, the Financial Times reported.
Citing unnamed sources familiar with the matter, the newspaper reported that Amodei was in talks with Emile Michael, the Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering, in a last-ditch effort to reach an agreement on the terms governing the Pentagon’s access to Anthropic’s Claude models.
Discussions broke down Friday when President Donald Trump ordered federal agencies to stop using Anthropic’s tools and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said he was designating the company as a supply chain risk to national security.
Last week, Michael accused Amodei of being a “liar” with a “God complex” in a post on X.
A new deal would allow the U.S. military to continue using Anthropic’s technology, which has reportedly been used in Washington’s war against Iran.
Claude was the first major model to be deployed on sensitive government networks through a $200 million contract awarded to Anthropic by the Pentagon, which later sought assurances that its tools would not be used for domestic surveillance or autonomous weapons. The Pentagon had requested that the military be allowed to use the technology legally.
In a Friday memo obtained by the FT, Amodei reportedly told staff that near the end of negotiations with the Pentagon, he offered to accept Anthropic’s terms if it removed “specific language regarding ‘analysis of bulk acquired data,'” which he said was “exactly consistent with the scenario that we were most concerned about.”
Amodei also wrote in the memo that messages from Open AI, which signed a new agreement with the Pentagon on Friday, “are either flat-out lying about these issues or are just trying to confuse us.”
The timing of OpenAI’s deal with the Pentagon, announced within hours of the White House condemning Anthropic, sparked a public backlash, and while Claude saw a spike in app downloads, ChatGPT reportedly saw a spike in app uninstalls.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman later said the company “should not have rushed” the contract and outlined modifications to the company’s safeguards for how the Pentagon could use its technology.
Altman further addressed the controversy in a post on X, saying, “In our conversations over the weekend, we reiterated that Anthropic should not be designated as a[supply chain risk]and that we hope[the Department of Defense]offers them the same terms that we agreed to.”
Anthropic was founded in 2021 by a group of former OpenAI staff and researchers. They left after disagreements over direction, and the company promoted itself as a “safety-first” alternative.
Government officials have criticized Anthropic for months for being overly concerned about the safety of its AI.
The technology industry group, whose members include Nvidia, Google and Anthropic, sent a letter to Hegseth on Wednesday expressing concern about his designation of U.S. companies as supply chain risks.
The Pentagon and Antropic did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request for comment on the reported negotiations.
