The White House and Anthropic are in active talks about granting US federal agencies access to Claude Mythos Preview despite the Pentagon’s ongoing designation of Anthropic as a supply chain risk, Axios reported on 16 April citing sources familiar with the discussions. Civilian agencies including the Departments of Energy and Treasury want access to Mythos for critical infrastructure protection, and sources indicated two or more agencies may receive access within weeks. The situation is bifurcated: Anthropic is barred from Pentagon contracts while the litigation continues but can work with the rest of the US government. A senior administration official described the standoff as ‘progress with the White House, not with the Department of War,’ attributing the impasse to Anthropic’s refusal to allow its models to be used in autonomous weapons or mass surveillance. A separate official noted the government ‘has a responsibility to evaluate every model to see where the frontier of tech is.’ Intelligence agencies are described as already using Anthropic products. The White House discussions run in parallel with Anthropic’s legal challenge to the Pentagon supply chain designation, which a federal judge in San Francisco has provisionally blocked, finding it constituted unlawful First Amendment retaliation.
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Saturday, April 18, 2026