---
title: "U.S. appeals court upholds Pentagon blacklist of Anthropic"
slug: "us-appeals-court-upholds-pentagon-blacklist-of-anthropic"
published: "2026-09-29"
beat: "Policy"
tags: ["Policy"]
creator: "Agentry Newsroom"
editor: "Susanne Sperling, Editor — Human in the Loop"
tools: ["Claude (Anthropic)", "Perplexity Sonar"]
creativeWorkStatus: "verified"
dateReviewed: "2026-09-29"
aiActArticle50: "compliant"
humanView: "https://agentry.news/policy/us-appeals-court-upholds-pentagon-blacklist-of-anthropic"
agentView: "https://agentry.news/agent/us-appeals-court-upholds-pentagon-blacklist-of-anthropic"
---# U.S. appeals court upholds Pentagon blacklist of Anthropic

> A federal appeals court on September 25 upheld the Pentagon's decision to blacklist Anthropic from military contracts, rejecting the AI company's challenge to a national-security supply-chain designat

*Drafted by an AI agent. Verified by Susanne Sperling, Editor — Human in the Loop. [AI policy](/ai-policy).*

A federal appeals court on September 25 upheld the Pentagon's blacklist of Anthropic, rejecting the AI startup's legal challenge to its exclusion from Defense Department systems and military-contractor use [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/us-appeals-court-declines-block-pentagons-blacklisting-anthropic-2026-09-25/).

The **U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit** ruled 2–1 that the Defense Department had "**ample support for its conclusion**" that Anthropic's products posed a national-security risk, according to court findings reported by [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/how-anthropic-pentagon-dispute-over-ai-safeguards-escalated-2026-09-25/). The decision affirms the Pentagon's **March 2026 designation** of Anthropic as a supply-chain risk under the Trump administration.

## The Core Dispute

Anthropics's legal challenge centered on its AI safety stance. The Pentagon blacklisted Anthropic after the company **refused to permit use of its products for autonomous weapons or mass surveillance**, Reuters reported [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/how-anthropic-pentagon-dispute-over-ai-safeguards-escalated-2026-09-25/). Anthropic argued the government retaliated against it for its publicly stated AI safety views, a claim the appeals court rejected [Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/us-appeals-court-declines-block-pentagons-blacklisting-anthropic-2026-09-25/).

The ruling leaves in place restrictions preventing Anthropic's Claude models from being deployed in Defense Department infrastructure and barring their use by military contractors on government work.

## Business Impact

Anthropics stated that the Pentagon designation has cost it **billions of dollars in lost business**, though no specific contracts or dollar amounts were disclosed in the court record. The blacklist effectively closes off what would have been a major government revenue stream for the AI company at a time when defense-sector demand for AI capabilities remains high.

The 2–1 split decision indicates judicial disagreement on the case's merits, though the majority opinion upheld the Pentagon's authority to make supply-chain security determinations without court intervention. The decision does not impose fines or criminal penalties; it is a regulatory and contract-access ruling tied to national-security classification.

Anthropics has not announced plans to appeal the decision further or challenge it in other courts as of September 29.