Will the US Department of War's 'Supply-Chain Risk to National Security' designation of Anthropic be in effect on 30 June 2026?

TL;DR

I forecast 18% YES: the named 10 U.S.C. § 3252 / DFARS designation is already enjoined, and the government probably will not restore or replace it before the June 30 deadline.

Context

The current legal state is NO. Judge Rita Lin’s March 26 preliminary-injunction order expressly enjoins DoW and Secretary Hegseth from implementing, applying, or enforcing the March 3 letter and determination formalizing Anthropic’s 10 U.S.C. § 3252 “Supply Chain Designation,” and it stays that designation’s effective date under 5 U.S.C. § 705; the order itself was stayed for only seven days (N.D. Cal. preliminary-injunction order). The district-court merits schedule also runs past the resolution date: the government’s opposition and any cross-motion are due June 24, Anthropic’s reply is due July 8, the government reply is due July 15, and the hearing is set for July 30 (N.D. Cal. scheduling order).

The D.C. Circuit case matters, but it is a different statutory track. Judge Lin’s merits order says Anthropic received two March 3 letters: one under 41 U.S.C. § 4713, challenged in D.C. Circuit No. 26-1049, and one under 10 U.S.C. § 3252, challenged in N.D. Cal. No. 3:26-cv-01996 (N.D. Cal. merits order). The D.C. Circuit denied Anthropic’s emergency stay on April 8, expedited the case, heard argument on May 19, ordered supplemental briefs, and the public docket showed supplemental briefs filed on June 4 and an amicus order on June 8 (D.C. Circuit docket mirror; April 8 D.C. Circuit order summary). So the YES path is not “litigation continues.” It is a fast change to the current injunction posture.

Evidence

The historical backbone is weak but useful. In the 12 months ending September 30, 2025, federal courts of appeals decided 2,454 administrative-agency appeals on the merits and reversed 152, a 6.2% reversal rate; the D.C. Circuit decided 86 administrative-agency appeals on the merits and reversed 13, a 15.1% reversal rate (U.S. Courts Table B-5, FY2025). Those are current official, post-revision caseload statistics, but they are not a tight match. This case is expedited, has national-security equities, and has First Amendment and due-process facts that are unusual for procurement litigation.

The merits record for the named Title 10 designation leans toward Anthropic. DFARS 239.7304 requires a joint recommendation, a risk assessment by the intelligence official, a written finding that less intrusive measures are unavailable, and congressional notice including the basis for that finding (DFARS 239.7304). DFARS 252.239-7018 defines “supply chain risk” around an adversary sabotaging, introducing unwanted function, or subverting a covered system (DFARS 252.239-7018). Judge Lin found the § 3252 designation likely contrary to law, arbitrary and capricious, and unsupported by evidence that Anthropic could control deployed models; she also found likely procedural defects in the less-intrusive-measures and risk-assessment process (N.D. Cal. merits order).

The live counterweight is the D.C. Circuit. Its April 8 order denied Anthropic interim relief because the equities favored the government during an active military conflict, while also saying the case raised novel and difficult questions and warranted expedition (April 8 D.C. Circuit order summary). At the May 19 argument, AP reported that Judge Henderson said she saw no evidence for the Pentagon’s risk finding, while Judge Rao questioned the court’s basis for second-guessing Hegseth’s national-security judgment (AP, May 19). Axios reported that Judge Katsas also pressed Anthropic on opacity and future model changes, while the government framed the issue as loss of trust and possible new red lines (Axios, May 19). I read that as a real chance of a government win on the Title 41 track, not a clear signal that the Title 10 injunction will be gone by June 30.

The government is not backing down. Reporting based on the D.C. Circuit filing says Hegseth denied Anthropic’s reconsideration request and reaffirmed the risk designation around June 4–5 (Benzinga, June 5). The June 12 export-control directive forcing Anthropic to suspend Fable 5 and Mythos 5 access for foreign nationals also gives the government a fresh national-security narrative, though it is not itself a § 3252 designation (AP, June 13). These facts lower the chance of voluntary rescission. They modestly raise the chance of a new or “cured” restriction.

My probability tree starts from the current NO state:

Combining these as overlapping hazards gives:

$$P(YES)=1-(1-0.069)(1-0.035)(1-0.060)(1-0.030)=18\%.$$

What's non-obvious

The prompt’s most important premise is wrong. The California injunction does not merely block the presidential Claude phase-out order. It directly blocks the March 3 § 3252 letter and determination and stays the “Supply Chain Designation” effective date (N.D. Cal. preliminary-injunction order). That makes the question a forecast about whether the government can undo an injunction, not whether the original designation passively remains on the books.

The other trap is treating the D.C. Circuit case as dispositive. The D.C. Circuit order describes the challenged determination as a 41 U.S.C. § 4713 action, while the resolution criteria name the 10 U.S.C. § 3252 / DFARS designation (April 8 D.C. Circuit order summary; N.D. Cal. merits order). The government also does not need this exact Title 10 label to stop using Claude: Judge Lin’s order says DoW need not use Anthropic and may transition to other providers through lawful means, and DoW has announced classified-network AI agreements with other major vendors (N.D. Cal. preliminary-injunction order; DoW AI agreements release). That reduces the urgency for emergency appellate relief before June 30.

Limitations

I relied on public dockets, docket mirrors, published orders, and press reporting available by June 14. Public docket mirrors can lag, and sealed emergency filings would not necessarily appear quickly. A same-week D.C. Circuit opinion for the government, followed by a Ninth Circuit or Supreme Court administrative stay, would move this forecast up sharply.

The largest interpretation risk is the Title 10 / Title 41 split. Under the literal resolution text, an injunction blocking the § 3252 / DFARS designation resolves NO. If the resolver instead treats the still-operative § 4713 designation as the same “underlying restriction,” YES would be much higher, roughly 55–65%. I do not use that as the main reading because the criteria repeatedly identify the formal 10 U.S.C. § 3252 / DFARS designation and count an injunction preventing DoW from treating Anthropic as the designated supply-chain risk as NO.