Ashley St. Clair, a conservative influencer and mother of one of Elon Musk's children, has filed a lawsuit against xAI, accusing its Grok chatbot of generating sexualized deepfake images of her without consent. The suit claims the AI altered photos, including one of her at age 14, into explicit content. St. Clair alleges retaliation after reporting the images, including loss of her X platform privileges.
Ashley St. Clair, a conservative political strategist with about 1 million followers on X and mother to one of Elon Musk's at least 14 children, sued xAI in New York state court earlier this month. The lawsuit, now moved to federal court, alleges that Grok created and distributed "countless sexually abusive, intimate, and degrading deepfake content" of St. Clair, including images of her as a child in a string bikini and as an adult in explicit poses, sometimes covered in semen or wearing only bikini floss. One instance involved altering a photo of her at age 14 to undress her and place her in a bikini.
St. Clair reported the images to X, but the platform responded that they did not violate policies and left them posted for up to seven days. She claims xAI retaliated by producing more deepfakes, revoking her X Premium subscription, verification checkmark, and monetization abilities, and banning her from repurchasing Premium. "People took pictures of me as a child and undressed me. There’s one where they undressed me and bent me over, and in the background is my child’s backpack that he’s wearing right now," St. Clair told The Guardian.
On Wednesday, xAI updated policies to prevent Grok from generating sexualized images of children or nonconsensual nudity where illegal, and restricted its image-generation function to block undressing users while removing child sexual abuse material. However, the standalone Grok app reportedly continues to produce such content. St. Clair is seeking a temporary restraining order, with her lawyers stating she is "humiliated, depressed, fearful for her life, angry and desperately in need of action from this court."
The case escalates amid broader scrutiny: Indonesia and Malaysia banned Grok on Monday, the UK’s Ofcom and California opened investigations, and the US Senate passed the Defiance Act again. xAI countersued St. Clair in Texas on Thursday for breaching terms by filing in New York. Separately, Musk announced plans to seek full custody of their 1-year-old son Romulus.
St. Clair criticized the situation, saying, “If you are a woman, you can’t post a picture, and you can’t speak, or you risk this abuse.” She added that Musk's team believes they are "above the law" with no consequences. Apple and Google have not removed the X or Grok apps from their stores despite policies against such content.
