Anthropic CEO reportedly calls OpenAI military deal claims ‘lies’

Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, called OpenAI’s public messaging about its Department of Defense deal “straight up lies” in a staff memo reported by The Information.

Anthropic and the DoD failed to reach a new agreement after the military sought unrestricted access to Anthropic’s AI, and Anthropic insisted on assurances that its technology would not be used for domestic mass surveillance or autonomous weapons.

Anthropic already holds a US$200 million contract with the DoD.

OpenAI announced it struck its own DoD deal and said in a blog post that the contract allows use for “all lawful purposes,” while the company and the DoD explicitly excluded mass domestic surveillance, according to OpenAI.

Amodei accused OpenAI CEO Sam Altman of falsely presenting himself as a “peacemaker and dealmaker” and said he worried the messaging could influence OpenAI employees.

🔗 Source: TechCrunch

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Implications, context, and why it matters.

### Anthropic ran into retaliation after talks collapsed

After negotiations broke down, the government responded with swift, hardline steps.
President Trump told federal agencies to stop using Anthropic’s technology, and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said he was labeling, or moving to designate, the company a “supply-chain risk” 1.
That label was called the “commercial equivalent of the death penalty,” since it could block major cloud providers that also serve as military contractors from working with Anthropic 2.
Tensions also turned personal when a top defense official publicly called Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei a liar and said he had a “God-complex” 1.

### AI labs face a split between government ties and consumer trust

The public dispute made clear that choices around military work can quickly reshape consumer behavior.
Anthropic climbed app-store charts, and TechCrunch reported U.S. downloads for Anthropic’s Claude rose 51% day-over-day on Saturday, February 28, with the app reaching No. 1 on the U.S. App Store 3.
OpenAI saw pushback after its Department of Defense (DoD) deal, with U.S. uninstalls of ChatGPT’s mobile app up 295% day-over-day on Saturday, February 28, plus 1-star reviews up 775% the same day, based on Sensor Tower data cited by TechCrunch 3.
This puts AI labs under pressure to balance government partnerships with public concern about AI used for surveillance and warfare 2.