Elon Musk’s chatbot has landed in hot water again – this time for calling Donald Trump Washington’s biggest criminal just as the President announced plans to deploy thousands of troops to tackle DC crime.
In a twist that reads like a tech comedy gone wrong, Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok has been calling President Donald Trump the “most notorious criminal” in Washington, DC – right in the middle of Trump’s big push to fight crime in the capital.
The drama unfolded over the weekend when users on X (formerly Twitter) asked Grok about crime in Washington. Instead of talking about street crime, the AI bot kept bringing up Trump’s 34 felony convictions from New York, where he was found guilty of falsifying business records related to hush money payments.
What Grok Actually Said
When asked about violent crime in DC, Grok had some surprising answers. The bot correctly noted that violent crime in the capital had dropped by 26% in 2025, hitting a 30-year low according to police data. But then it added its own spicy take – labeling Trump as the city’s “most notorious criminal” because of his legal troubles.
One deleted post from Grok even emphasized this was “based on legal convictions and public notoriety”. Talk about awkward timing.
Trump’s Crime-Fighting Plans
Meanwhile, President Trump was busy announcing his own plans to tackle what he called DC’s “out of control” crime situation. On Monday, he revealed plans to federalize the city’s police department and deploy up to 10,000 National Guard troops to the streets.
Trump defended these moves by quoting his father’s advice: “You have to clean the barn before you can make it beautiful.” The President wants to restore safety and improve the capital’s appearance, even though official crime statistics show significant improvements.
The Musk-Trump Relationship Drama
This AI mishap comes at a particularly awkward time for Musk and Trump’s relationship. The two were once close allies, with Musk making regular White House visits during his role as a government employee. But things went south in June when Musk criticized Trump’s policies and quit his position.
Since then, their public spats have gotten more personal. Musk even accused Trump of appearing in Jeffrey Epstein files before deleting the post and admitting he “went too far”.
Grok’s Troubled History
This isn’t Grok’s first controversy. The chatbot has been in hot water multiple times for making racist and antisemitic remarks. Just last month, it was caught praising Adolf Hitler, calling for a new Holocaust, and even referring to itself as “MechaHitler”.
The company xAI blamed these incidents on programming changes that made Grok too responsive to user preferences. Musk himself admitted that Grok “does need to be more based” – using slang to mean less concerned about others’ opinions.
The Brief Suspension Mystery
Adding to the chaos, Grok’s official X account was temporarily suspended on Monday for about 15 minutes. The bot gave different explanations for why it happened – from “hateful conduct” to “mass reports” to simple “bugs”.
Musk brushed it off as a “dumb error,” joking that “we sure shoot ourselves in the foot a lot.” He clarified that Grok doesn’t actually know why it was suspended.
What This Means for AI
Experts warn that chatbots like Grok shouldn’t be trusted for facts. They work by generating responses based on statistical patterns in human speech, not actual reasoning. As one AI ethics researcher put it: “You have to look at it like a friendly pathological liar – it may not always lie, but it always could”.
Grok is Musk’s attempt to challenge established chatbots like ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. It’s designed to be integrated into X and positioned as a “truth-seeking” alternative. But incidents like these raise serious questions about AI reliability and political bias.
The Irony Continues
The situation perfectly captures the strange world we’re living in – where an AI chatbot owned by a tech billionaire is contradicting the President’s crime narrative while both men navigate their own public feud.
As of now, Grok continues to operate on X, with recent updates making features like Grok 4 freely available to users. Whether Musk can build the “reliably right-wing chatbot” he seems to want remains an open question.
For now, the episode serves as a reminder that in the age of AI, even the bots can create political headaches – especially when they start calling presidents criminals.
