Microsoft filed an amicus brief in the US District Court for the Northern District of California seeking a temporary restraining order to block the Pentagon’s designation of Anthropic as a supply-chain risk. The filing warns that mandating the immediate removal of Anthropic’s Claude model, which enforces safeguards against mass surveillance and autonomous weapons, could disrupt ongoing federal projects and impair US warfighters.

The Department of Defense’s supply-chain risk designation halted all Anthropic contracts after the company declined to remove military use restrictions from its AI model. Critics argue the directive is vague and ill-defined, extending beyond routine contract disputes and raising constitutional questions about corporate speech protections.

Separately, Microsoft secured a multi-year AI infrastructure agreement with Nebius valued at more than $19 billion, under which Nebius will deploy 5 GW of Nvidia GPU systems by 2030. The deal strengthens Microsoft’s Azure cloud AI capacity, positioning it to support large-scale AI workloads and compete with hyperscale providers.