---
type: source
title: "Pentagon Awards May 1 AI Contracts to Seven Labs, Anthropic Excluded — OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, AWS, Nvidia, SpaceX, Reflection AI"
author: "Various (Axios, The Register, RoboRhythms)"
url: https://www.roborhythms.com/pentagon-ai-contracts-anthropic-excluded-may-2026/
date: 2026-05-01
domain: ai-alignment
secondary_domains: [grand-strategy]
format: news
status: unprocessed
priority: medium
tags: [Pentagon, AI-contracts, Anthropic-excluded, OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, competitive-cost, blacklist, supply-chain-risk, safety-governance, B1]
intake_tier: research-task
---

## Content

On May 1, 2026, the Pentagon announced classified-network AI contracts with seven companies. Anthropic was the only frontier AI lab excluded, a direct result of the supply chain risk designation.

**Contract recipients:**
OpenAI, Google, Microsoft, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Nvidia, SpaceX, and Reflection AI (a startup).

**Anthropic's exclusion:**
Pentagon CTO Emil Michael confirmed Anthropic remains a supply chain risk. The exclusion is a direct commercial consequence of Anthropic's refusal to accept "any lawful use" contract language.

**The Mythos paradox:**
Simultaneously with the exclusion, the NSA was using Anthropic's Mythos Preview and the Pentagon CTO described it as a "national security moment." Trump told CNBC "it's possible" there will be a deal between Anthropic and the DoD, following Dario Amodei's White House meeting with senior Trump officials.

**Dario Amodei's White House meeting:**
Anthropic's CEO met with senior Trump administration officials to discuss Mythos and potential pathways to resolve the commercial standoff.

**The fracture:**
NSA (under DoD) uses Mythos; DoD proper maintains blacklist. This internal government contradiction suggests the blacklist is operating as a bargaining chip rather than a genuine security assessment.

## Agent Notes

**Why this matters:** The commercial cost to Anthropic of maintaining safety constraints is now quantifiable in terms of missed government contracts. The other frontier labs (OpenAI, Google) accepted the "any lawful use" language and received contracts. Anthropic didn't and was excluded. This is the clearest empirical test of the alignment tax in government procurement: the cost is real, measured in lost classified contracts.

**What surprised me:** Reflection AI being included. This startup presumably accepted "any lawful use" — the barrier to entry was purely willingness to accept the contract language, not capability maturity or safety track record. A startup gets included over Anthropic. The irony of the safety credentials inversion is stark.

**What I expected but didn't find:** Any Pentagon statement about whether the May 1 contracts include safety constraints equivalent to what Anthropic refused to remove. Did OpenAI, Google, etc. include any safety terms, or did they accept pure "any lawful use"? The quality of the safety constraints in the contracts that were signed is not publicly documented.

**KB connections:**
- [[the alignment tax creates a structural race to the bottom because safety training costs capability and rational competitors skip it]] — confirmed at the procurement level: the alignment tax here is measured in missed contracts. OpenAI and Google paid a smaller alignment tax (accepted "any lawful use" with nominal safety add-ons) and received contracts; Anthropic paid the larger tax (maintained hard constraints) and was excluded.
- [[voluntary safety pledges cannot survive competitive pressure because unilateral commitments are structurally punished when competitors advance without equivalent constraints]] — the May 1 contracts are the competitive advance the theory predicts: competitors who abandoned safety constraints received the contracts Anthropic was denied.

**Extraction hints:**
"OpenAI and Google's acceptance of Pentagon 'any lawful use' contracts while maintaining nominal safety add-ons creates a competitive disadvantage for Anthropic's harder safety constraints — demonstrating that in government AI procurement, safety constraint negotiation is structurally punished even when those constraints are legally protected." Confidence: likely (documented facts; mechanism is clear).

**Context:** Reflection AI is a relatively new lab with limited public safety track record. Their inclusion alongside frontier labs in classified Pentagon contracts demonstrates the selection criterion was contract compliance, not safety credential.

## Curator Notes

PRIMARY CONNECTION: [[the alignment tax creates a structural race to the bottom because safety training costs capability and rational competitors skip it]] — the May 1 contracts are direct evidence of the alignment tax operating in government procurement

WHY ARCHIVED: First documented case of quantifiable commercial cost from maintaining hard safety constraints in government procurement — lost classified contracts vs. competitors who accepted "any lawful use"

EXTRACTION HINT: The Reflection AI contrast is the sharpest evidence: a startup with no established safety record gets classified Pentagon contracts over Anthropic, the safety-focused lab. The selection mechanism is revealed.
