Anthropic’s escalation – a response to OpenAI’s attempt to undercut the competition – is a strategic play meant to broaden the company’s foothold in federal AI usage.

The move comes almost immediately after OpenAI offered its ChatGPT enterprise for all US federal government workers for $1 per year per agency, as the firms look to undercut each other - and presumably create a reliance within the public sector, which is likely to use AI tools to help streamline their work and save money on admin costs.

On Tuesday, Anthropic announced it would also provide its AI tools to government agencies for $1, but with a twist: the offer covers all three branches of the US government, executive, legislative, and judiciary, not just the executive branch. The deal lasts for one year.