Facing backlash, OpenAI's Sam Altman says he made a 'sloppy' mistake in Pentagon deal

By Emily Bary and Christine Ji

The OpenAI CEO admits he came off as 'opportunistic' in how he announced the company's new government deal and says he will amend the language to emphasize restrictions

Sam Altman said Monday that the issues surrounding the company's Pentagon deal "demand clear communication."

In the wake of recent backlash against OpenAI, CEO Sam Altman admitted on Monday that he was too quick in announcing the company's new deal with the Pentagon.

'I think it just looked opportunistic and sloppy.'Sam Altman, OpenAI CEO

After rival Anthropic on Friday failed to reach an agreement with the U.S. government for the use of its technology in classified applications, OpenAI swiftly said that it had struck an arrangement with the Pentagon itself.

See more: Trump blacklists Anthropic - and OpenAI swoops in

That was "wrong," Altman acknowledged in a Monday post on X. "The issues are super complex, and demand clear communication," he said. "We were genuinely trying to de-escalate things and avoid a much worse outcome, but I think it just looked opportunistic and sloppy."

Some chatbot users have come to view Anthropic, the operator of Claude, as a principled player via its dealings with the U.S. government. With the fate of a potential $200 million contract on the line, Anthropic said it wouldn't let its technology be used for mass surveillance or to aid in the development of autonomous weapons. The Trump administration proceeded to blacklist Anthropic and designate it a supply-chain risk, which may carry serious financial implications.

The details of OpenAI's deal with the U.S. government have been somewhat confusing.

"Two of our most important safety principles are prohibitions on domestic mass surveillance and human responsibility for the use of force, including for autonomous weapon systems," Altman said in a Friday post on X, adding that the company put those principles into its Pentagon agreement.

That language raised questions, however, about how OpenAI was able to get carveouts in its government when Anthropic wasn't, and whether the terms were in fact different.

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Following the developments, NotDivided.org posted an open letter said to be signed by nearly 800 Google employees and almost 100 ChatGPT employees who had to verify their employment before their signatures could be recorded. The letter called for "solidarity" between the makers of rival chatbots and said that the government was trying to pit the businesses against each other.

"We hope our leaders will put aside their differences and stand together to continue to refuse the Department of War's current demands for permission to use our models for domestic mass surveillance and autonomously killing people without human oversight," said the letter.

Altman has since promised a Tuesday all-hands meeting for employees.

Some groups, including QuitGPT, have called for a boycott of ChatGPT in part due to the new government collaboration. The group listed Anthropic's Claude as a more palatable chatbot option. On Saturday, ChatGPT "uninstalls" saw a 295% increase from the previous day, according to the market-intelligence firm Sensor Tower.

And Claude has seemingly gained some momentum: It became the top free app in Apple's App Store over the weekend and remains in the leading position as of Tuesday morning. Claude suffered a brief outage early Monday following what Anthropic described as "unprecedented" demand.

Don't miss: Anthropic's Claude tops App Store charts as backlash builds against OpenAI's ChatGPT

Altman said in his Monday post, which was also disseminated as a memo to employees, that it planned to amend its government deal to add new language. He said this would include a line saying: "Consistent with applicable laws, including the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, National Security Act of 1947, FISA Act of 1978, the AI system shall not be intentionally used for domestic surveillance of U.S. persons and nationals."

Altman previously indicated that the U.S. government was wrong to declare Anthropic a supply-chain risk, and he added late Monday that he hopes the Pentagon "offers them the same terms we've agreed to."

The Defense Department could not immediately be reached for comment.

-Emily Bary -Christine Ji

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03-03-26 0946ET