The mother of one of Elon Musk's children is suing his AI company, saying its Grok chatbot allowed users to generate sexually exploitive deepfake images of her that have caused her humiliation and emotional distress.
Ashley St. Clair, 27, who describes herself as a writer and political strategist, alleges in a lawsuit filed Thursday in New York City against xAI that the images have included a photo of her fully dressed at age 14 that was altered to show her in a bikini, and others showing her as an adult in sexualized positions and wearing a bikini with swastikas. St. Clair is Jewish. Grok is on Musk's social media platform X.
Lawyers for xAI did not immediately return emails seeking comment Friday. On Wednesday, following global backlash over sexualized images of women and children, X announced that Grok would no longer be able to edit photos to portray real people in revealing clothing, in places where that is illegal.
Asked about the lawsuit and its allegations, xAI replied only “Legacy Media Lies” in an email to The Associated Press.
St. Clair said she reported the deepfakes to X after they began appearing last year and asked that they be removed. She said the platform first replied that the images did not violate its policies. Then it promised to not allow images of her to be used or altered without her consent, she said.
St. Clair said the social platform then retaliated against her by removing her premium X subscription and verification checkmark, not allowing her to make money from her account, which has 1 million followers, and continuing to allow degrading fake images of her.
“I have suffered and continue to suffer serious pain and mental distress as a result of xAI’s role in creating and distributing these digitally altered images of me,” she said in a document attached to the lawsuit. “I am humiliated and feel like this nightmare will never stop so long as Grok continues to generate these images of me.”
She also said she lives in fear of the people who view the deepfakes of her.
St. Clair is the mother of Musk's 16-month-old son, Romulus. She lives in New York City, where she filed the lawsuit in state Supreme Court. She is seeking an undisclosed amount of damages for alleged infliction of emotional distress and other claims, as well as court orders immediately barring xAI from allowing more deepfakes of her.
Later Thursday, lawyers for xAI transferred the lawsuit to federal court in Manhattan, asking a judge to hear the case there. And the same day, xAI also countersued St. Clair in federal court in the Northern District of Texas, alleging she violated the terms of her xAI user agreement that requires lawsuits against the company be filed in federal court in Texas. It is seeking an undisclosed money judgment against her.
X is based in Texas, where Musk owns a home and his electric automaker Tesla in headquartered in Austin.
Carrie Goldberg, a lawyer for St. Clair, called the countersuit a “jolting” move that she had never seen by a defendant before.
“Ms. St. Clair will be vigorously defending her forum in New York,” Goldberg said in a statement. “But frankly, any jurisdiction will recognize the gravamen of Ms. St. Clair’s claims — that by manufacturing nonconsensual sexually explicit images of girls and women, xAI is a public nuisance and a not reasonably safe product.”
In its announcement on Wednesday, X said it was implementing other safeguards on Grok including limiting image creation and editing to paid accounts, which it said would improve accountability. It said it had zero tolerance for child sexual exploitation, nonconsensual nudity and unwanted sexual content, and it would immediately remove such content and report accounts involved in child sex abuse materials to law enforcement.
FILE - Gas turbines are seen at the xAI facility, Monday, Dec. 15, 2025, in Memphis, Tenn. (AP Photo/George Walker IV, File)
FILE - Elon Musk attends a memorial for conservative activist Charlie Kirk, Sunday, Sept. 21, 2025, at State Farm Stadium in Glendale, Ariz. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson, File)
DALLAS (AP) — The mess in Texas may be just beginning.
Four-term Sen. John Cornyn and his allies spent nearly $70 million to survive the first round of the party’s nomination fight on Tuesday. He was slightly ahead of conservative firebrand Ken Paxton, the state attorney general, with more votes still being counted on Wednesday.
Both now advance to a May 26 runoff election that Republicans fear could be even uglier and more expensive than the first contest.
“It's judgment day for Ken Paxton,” Cornyn said on Tuesday night.
But whether any level of attacks can stop Paxton — who has long been shadowed by allegations of corruption and infidelity — remains unclear, especially as he fashions himself as the kind of Make America Great Again warrior President Donald Trump needs in Washington.
Paxton was defiant when speaking to a few hundred supporters at a Dallas hotel ballroom, a far different scene than Cornyn's small press conference.
“We just sent a message, loud and clear, to Washington,” he said. “We are not going to go quietly, and we are not going to let you buy the seat.”
Republicans are sweating the runoff because the 83-day sprint takes place as operatives in both major political parties acknowledge that Democrats have an unusually solid chance of winning a Senate seat in Texas this year, something that hasn't happened in nearly four decades.
Democrats nominated state Rep. James Talarico, who Republicans immediately attacked as a far-left extremist — even though they privately consider the 36-year-old Christian progressive to be a stronger general election candidate than his primary opponent, Rep. Jasmine Crockett.
The Texas contest is playing out as Trump fights to maintain control of Congress for his final two years in the White House. Republicans are more confident about keeping their majority in the Senate than the House, but a competitive race in Texas could scramble the map, or at least consume resources that the party needs in more competitive states like North Carolina, Maine, Ohio and Alaska.
Republican leaders in Washington insist that Cornyn has the best shot, especially after he finished ahead of Paxton in Tuesday's primary, with U.S. Rep. Wesley Hunt finishing a distant third and conceding. Cornyn's campaign argued that a runoff wouldn't even be necessary if it wasn't for “Wesley Hunt's vanity campaign.”
“Paxton’s problems aren’t just an issue in a Republican primary; they also threaten to put the Senate seat at risk due to his lack of strength against Democrat nominee Talarico," a memo from Cornyn's team said.
But Paxton and his allies are showing no signs of backing down.
“The D.C. establishment has done its job: it rallied around its wounded incumbent, opened the fundraising spigot, and flooded the airwaves. But the results, the data, and the reality on the ground all point to the same conclusion: John Cornyn has no viable path to the Republican nomination,” the pro-Paxton Lone Star PAC wrote in a memo. “Cornyn should suspend his campaign, concede the nomination to Ken Paxton, and refuse to allow another $100+ million in Republican resources to be burned in a race that is already decided.”
The only person who might be able to forestall the intraparty fight, or at least limit its fallout, is Trump. But the president has declined to endorse a candidate in the primary, describing all of them as “great,” and it was unclear if anything would change in the runoff.
Without Trump's support, Cornyn made it clear that he would make the case himself. He told reporters that Paxton would be “a dead weight at the top of the ticket for Republicans" in November.
“I’ve worked for decades to build the Republican Party, both here in Texas and nationally,” Cornyn said. “I refuse to allow a flawed, self-centered and shameless candidate like Ken Paxton to risk everything we’ve worked so hard to build over these many years.”
Cornyn will face intense fundraising pressure, having already spent so much money in the first round of the primary. Aides said he had some small fundraisers planned but nothing in the days immediately after this week's vote as he returns to Washington.
In addition, Paxton's allies are confident that the political landscape will tilt in the attorney general's favor.
“The casual and moderate Republican voters who are most likely to support an establishment incumbent are the least likely to return for a runoff,” said the memo from the Lone Star PAC. “The committed conservative activists who form Paxton’s base are the most likely to show up.”
Follow the AP's coverage of the 2026 elections at https://apnews.com/hub/elections.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, speaks during a primary election night watch party Tuesday, March 3, 2026, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, speaks to the media Tuesday, March 3, 2026, in Austin, Texas. (AP Photo/Jack Myer)
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate, speaks during a primary election night watch party Tuesday, March 3, 2026, in Dallas. (AP Photo/Julio Cortez)
Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, speaks to the media Tuesday, March 3, 2026, in Austin, Texas. (AP Photo/Jack Myer)
