AI giant’s lobbyist spending exploded as it clashed with Trump administration
This feels like a quiet policy shift.
As Antropic’s relationship with the White House oscillated between warm and cold in 2025, the artificial intelligence giant’s spending on lobbyists skyrocketed.
Anthropic’s monthly lobbying expenditures have increased by roughly 511% over the course of President Donald Trump’s second term in office, rising from $180,000 at the end of the first quarter of 2024 to $1.1 million during the final quarter of 2025. Even as Anthropic publicly butted heads with the Trump administration, the firm has been eager, in private, to pay Republicans and Democrats alike to win over those in power.
The final quarter of 2025 saw conflicts between the Trump administration and Anthropic over the former’s approach to AI regulation. The tensions came to a head when Anthropic cofounder Jack Clark penned an essay criticizing some in the tech world for dismissing concerns that AI could threaten humanity’s existence.
“What we are dealing with is a real and mysterious creature, not a simple and predictable machine,” Clark wrote of AI. “And like all the best fairytales, the creature is of our own creation. Only by acknowledging it as being real and by mastering our own fears do we even have a chance to understand it, make peace with it, and figure out a way to tame it and live together.”
Venture capitalist David Sacks, the White House’s special adviser for AI and crypto, hit back shortly after Clark published his essay, accusing Anthropic of hijacking concerns about AI development to construct a regulatory environment favorable to its bottom line.
“Anthropic is running a sophisticated regulatory capture strategy based on fear-mongering,” he wrote. “It is principally responsible for the state regulatory frenzy that is damaging the startup ecosystem.”
The trading of blows between Sacks and Clark fits into a broader policy conflict over the regulation of AI. On one side of the issue are voices such as Sacks, who view the advancement of AI as a powerful engine for economic growth and fear that the United States could be left behind by global competitors if it over-regulates the industry. Those in Clark’s camp, meanwhile, maintain that while AI is incredibly promising, unchecked development could wreak havoc on human civilization through economic upheaval or even extinction.
While the Trump administration has generally been friendly toward the former perspective, the latter won a major victory in July 2025 when the Senate advanced a version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act …
This feels like a quiet policy shift.
As Antropic’s relationship with the White House oscillated between warm and cold in 2025, the artificial intelligence giant’s spending on lobbyists skyrocketed.
Anthropic’s monthly lobbying expenditures have increased by roughly 511% over the course of President Donald Trump’s second term in office, rising from $180,000 at the end of the first quarter of 2024 to $1.1 million during the final quarter of 2025. Even as Anthropic publicly butted heads with the Trump administration, the firm has been eager, in private, to pay Republicans and Democrats alike to win over those in power.
The final quarter of 2025 saw conflicts between the Trump administration and Anthropic over the former’s approach to AI regulation. The tensions came to a head when Anthropic cofounder Jack Clark penned an essay criticizing some in the tech world for dismissing concerns that AI could threaten humanity’s existence.
“What we are dealing with is a real and mysterious creature, not a simple and predictable machine,” Clark wrote of AI. “And like all the best fairytales, the creature is of our own creation. Only by acknowledging it as being real and by mastering our own fears do we even have a chance to understand it, make peace with it, and figure out a way to tame it and live together.”
Venture capitalist David Sacks, the White House’s special adviser for AI and crypto, hit back shortly after Clark published his essay, accusing Anthropic of hijacking concerns about AI development to construct a regulatory environment favorable to its bottom line.
“Anthropic is running a sophisticated regulatory capture strategy based on fear-mongering,” he wrote. “It is principally responsible for the state regulatory frenzy that is damaging the startup ecosystem.”
The trading of blows between Sacks and Clark fits into a broader policy conflict over the regulation of AI. On one side of the issue are voices such as Sacks, who view the advancement of AI as a powerful engine for economic growth and fear that the United States could be left behind by global competitors if it over-regulates the industry. Those in Clark’s camp, meanwhile, maintain that while AI is incredibly promising, unchecked development could wreak havoc on human civilization through economic upheaval or even extinction.
While the Trump administration has generally been friendly toward the former perspective, the latter won a major victory in July 2025 when the Senate advanced a version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act …
AI giant’s lobbyist spending exploded as it clashed with Trump administration
This feels like a quiet policy shift.
As Antropic’s relationship with the White House oscillated between warm and cold in 2025, the artificial intelligence giant’s spending on lobbyists skyrocketed.
Anthropic’s monthly lobbying expenditures have increased by roughly 511% over the course of President Donald Trump’s second term in office, rising from $180,000 at the end of the first quarter of 2024 to $1.1 million during the final quarter of 2025. Even as Anthropic publicly butted heads with the Trump administration, the firm has been eager, in private, to pay Republicans and Democrats alike to win over those in power.
The final quarter of 2025 saw conflicts between the Trump administration and Anthropic over the former’s approach to AI regulation. The tensions came to a head when Anthropic cofounder Jack Clark penned an essay criticizing some in the tech world for dismissing concerns that AI could threaten humanity’s existence.
“What we are dealing with is a real and mysterious creature, not a simple and predictable machine,” Clark wrote of AI. “And like all the best fairytales, the creature is of our own creation. Only by acknowledging it as being real and by mastering our own fears do we even have a chance to understand it, make peace with it, and figure out a way to tame it and live together.”
Venture capitalist David Sacks, the White House’s special adviser for AI and crypto, hit back shortly after Clark published his essay, accusing Anthropic of hijacking concerns about AI development to construct a regulatory environment favorable to its bottom line.
“Anthropic is running a sophisticated regulatory capture strategy based on fear-mongering,” he wrote. “It is principally responsible for the state regulatory frenzy that is damaging the startup ecosystem.”
The trading of blows between Sacks and Clark fits into a broader policy conflict over the regulation of AI. On one side of the issue are voices such as Sacks, who view the advancement of AI as a powerful engine for economic growth and fear that the United States could be left behind by global competitors if it over-regulates the industry. Those in Clark’s camp, meanwhile, maintain that while AI is incredibly promising, unchecked development could wreak havoc on human civilization through economic upheaval or even extinction.
While the Trump administration has generally been friendly toward the former perspective, the latter won a major victory in July 2025 when the Senate advanced a version of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act …
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