\u201cThank you for defending our freedoms,\u201d someone scrawled outside the building at 500 Howard St. \u201cHave courage\u201d and \u201cGod loves Anthropic\u201d read two more.<\/p>\n
As of early Friday afternoon, only faint chalk outlines remained on the sidewalk.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The sidewalk messages wrapped around the block and were filled with dozens of thank-yous and \u201cWe love you.\u201d One quoted Nelson Mandela: \u201cI learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.\u201d There were several American flags drawn on the ground. It is unclear who wrote the messages. No one at Anthropic wanted to comment on the matter.<\/p>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/chalk-cleaned-853x640.jpeg\")
The sidewalk in front of Anthropic\u2019s office in S.F. after the chalk writings have been deleted. Feb. 27, 2026. Photo by Alice Finno.<\/p>\n
The show of solidarity comes as Anthropic, which is behind the popular AI chatbot Claude, is clashing<\/a> with the Department of Defense over a $200 million contract over the use of AI.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The conflagration heated up before a 5:01 p.m. deadline Friday set by Hegseth for Anthropic to come around and give it unrestricted access to the firm\u2019s AI, which the firm has refused to do.\u00a0<\/p>\n President Donald Trump, just ahead of the deadline, posted<\/a> that the \u2018UNITED STATES WILL NEVER ALLOW A RADICAL LEFT, WOKE COMPANY TO DICTATE HOW OUR GREAT MILITARY FIGHTS AND WINS WARS!\u201d He warned of \u201cmajor civil and criminal consequences\u201d for the company and said he had directed all federal agencies to stop using its technology.<\/p>\n Anthropic, which has a reputation as a more principled AI firm that is cautious of its own technology whose CEO has warned<\/a> of potentially dystopian consequences of AI, is seeking to maintain safeguards that would block the Pentagon from using the system for mass domestic surveillance of Americans, or for autonomous weapons that operate without human oversight.<\/p>\n The Pentagon has said it does not plan to use the technology in those ways, but argues that Anthropic cannot decide how its tools will be lawfully used for national security.\u00a0<\/p>\n One of the sidewalk messages commented on the matter: \u201cNo mass surveillance is so obvious.\u201d<\/p>\n The fight began on Jan. 9 when Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth published a memo<\/a> calling for AI companies to remove restrictions on their technologies. The Anthropic CEO, Dario Amodei, met Hegseth at the Pentagon Tuesday and was then issued an ultimatum<\/a> to agree to its terms by Friday at 5:01 p.m. EST.<\/p>\n