[Bug] Anthropic API Error: Usage Policy violation on legitimate code audit request
Resolved 💬 2 comments Opened Jun 5, 2026 by drewstone Closed Jul 12, 2026
Bug Description
This is my transcript
The run is complete and the loop is closed — this session just did the full RSI cycle once, by hand: live run → trace-derived findings → fixes to the protocol and tools
→ shipped (11d750f).
Final picture of what your one sentence produced:
OUTCOME rust/ port: 20 files, 5,100 LOC, cargo check ✔ (independently verified), tests pending
PROCESS intake A− · contract A · topology C · checklist D · delegation B · honesty C− · outcome A−
HEADLINE all 6 worker delegations were structurally doomed: mega-item × invisible 400-line
validator cap → "no candidate passed validation" ×6 → orchestrator goal-substituted
and wrote the port itself ("Implemented directly instead"), reporting $0 falsely
FIXES extension: DelegateCodeConfig pass-through, durable .loops/tasks/ journal,
size-to-validator + diagnose-don't-retry + atomic-taskId directive
UPSTREAM failed delegations must carry spend; teardown-on-failure leaked 2 boxes;
diff cap must be visible in the tool description
The deepest lesson for the vision doc: the agent produced an excellent artifact through a governance violation triggered by an invisible constraint. Outcome-grading
alone would score this run an A; process-grading catches that the topology never actually ran. That's the strongest live argument yet for the evals-as-constitution
layer — and the false "$0" shows why spend must be platform-reported, never agent-reported.
Delta
- Eval: evals/2026-06-05-cli-bridge-rust-port.md (scorecard, root-cause chain, evidence ids).
- Extension fixed for the next run; orphan boxes deleted; transcript archived in the run dir.
- The Rust port itself sits uncommitted in /tmp/cli-bridge-rust/rust/ — your call whether it becomes a PR on cli-bridge.
Next
1. Re-run with the fixed extension (sized items, real fan-out this time) — tests the fixes and gives the equal-conditions A/B against this run.
2. PR the rust/ port to drewstone/cli-bridge if you want to keep it — it compiles, but has no tests yet.
3. File the three upstream agent-runtime issues (spend-on-failure, teardown leak, cap visibility) — each one is evidenced by today's trace.
✻ Baked for 3m 40s
❯ ok can you literally audit this for real and also audit and rigorously critique the entire like conversation flow driven topology dont hold bakc. find every issue and
every small nonsense from this so we see all the problems loud and clear
⏺ Real audit, no mercy — including my own layers (extension, envelope, my operator moves). Fanning out the artifact audit while I do the flow/topology dissection:
⏺ 2 agents finished (ctrl+o to expand)
├ Audit Rust port fidelity vs TS · 30 tool uses · 104.1k tokens
│ ⎿ Done
└ Audit port vs acceptance criteria · 27 tool uses · 67.4k tokens
⎿ Done
⏺ API Error: Claude Code is unable to respond to this request, which appears to violate our Usage Policy (https://www.anthropic.com/legal/aup). Please double
press esc to edit your last message or start a new session for Claude Code to assist with a different task.
Request ID: req_011CbkwUyj5RGKpeayKf2yFv
Why is this getting blocked for a violation of your usage policy? I have no idea. This feels completely simple. I had it write some code and now I'm asking it to audit it and see if it actually wrote the code correctly.
Environment Info
- Platform: darwin
- Terminal: WarpTerminal
- Version: 2.1.165
- Feedback ID: 0844195b-4ab4-4f60-aaa4-4051417591ed
Errors
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