A 2022 chat with an Anthropic cofounder — 'the serious people in Washington trust me' — sealed the hire
himanshustwts · x · 2026-10-30
A reposted 2022 recollection: someone weighing an OpenAI offer had a casual lunch chat with one of Anthropic's cofounders about making AI go well. When the author argued "the government won't do anything about AI until it's far too late — our strategy has to rely on the market and civil society," the cofounder leaned forward: "You're wrong there. There are people in Washington — the serious people — watching all this very closely. I speak to them regularly. They trust me."
"In retrospect, that was the moment I decided to join." The anecdote offers a window into Anthropic's founding team's early confidence in engaging policymakers, and a well-known hiring story from the AI talent wars.
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