Grok AI chatbot misidentifies NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani in bizarre Epstein conspiracy analysis

Grok's Analysis of Whether Mamdani Is Related to Epstein May Be the Single Most Amazing AI Response We've Ever Seen

Along with being used to generate nonconsensual sexual images of women and girls, spread racist rhetoric, and doxx the home addresses of both celebrities and non-public figures, Elon Musk's AI chatbot Grok is struggling to get a grip on reality. The mercurial billionaire's social media platform X, which was folded into his AI startup xAI last year -- and subsequently acquired by SpaceX this week -- has once again been thrust into the center of the ongoing scandal surrounding the Justice Department's release of millions of files pertaining to its investigation into the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Musk has been in full damage control mode, struggling to reconcile his attempts to downplay his personal relationship with the notorious predator with some damning emails that suggest he was actively trying to invite himself to Epstein's island in the Caribbean. Adding to the chaos is Musk's xAI chatbot Grok, which he's advertised as "maximally truth-seeking" -- but which is instead sowing chaos into the explosive revelations about Epstein. The result may be one of the most amazing AI responses we've ever seen. No, seriously: when a X account asked Grok to calculate the "probability" that New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani is somehow related to Epstein, based on perceived similarities in the shapes of their eyebrows and mouths, the AI chatbot had a downright baffling answer. The account showed Grok two headshots of the two men side by side, with two arrows pointing to their eyebrows and circles around their respective mouths, as if to suggest they were genetically related. The odd request may have been related to recently released documents implicating Mamdani's mother, Mira Nair, who attended a 2009 afterparty at the house of convicted sex trafficker and Epstein's close collaborator Ghislaine Maxwell. However, there's currently no evidence to suggest that Nair knew about or was involved in any criminal activity. All that flew far above the AI chatbot's head, though, as it failed to even accurately identify Mamdani. "Based on the image, these seem to be [late-night TV host] Jimmy Kimmel (left) and Jeffrey Epstein (right)," the chatbot responded. "They share minor similarities in eyebrow arch and mouth shape, but differences in age, hair, and features are clear." Yes, that's right: the chatbot that Musk has deployed to untold millions of users on X, which now operates as a de facto fact-checking machine used to settle arguments on the chaotic site, can't even tell the difference between Zohran Mamdani and Jimmy Kimmel, who look nothing alike. At least it admitted its error -- though only after prodding. "Correction: That's actually Zohran Mamdani on the left, not Jimmy Kimmel -- my bad on the initial ID," the chatbot conceded. "Similarities in eyebrows and smiles are there, but no known family ties to Epstein. Probability of relation: under one percent based on public info." The chatbot's gaffe shows yet again how even a seemingly straightforward task like identifying a well-known figure, who has been photographed many thousands of times, from a well-lit headshot appears to be beyond the tech's capabilities -- despite xAI pouring billions of dollars into its development. Coincidentally, Mamdani used his powers as New York City's mayor to shut down a "functionally unusable" AI chatbot just last week. The chatbot was set up by disgraced former mayor Eric Adams to help small business owners navigate local regulations, costing the administration "around half a million dollars," per Mamdani. Not unlike Grok, Adams' chatbot was shown to be incredibly unreliable, often contradicting actual labor law.

Zohran Mamdani Is The Latest Victim of Epstein Files AI Slop

Trump Admin. Having a Hard Time Selling Narrative Around Latest ICE Killing If you happened to check social media in the aftermath of the Trump administration's latest drop of Epstein files, you may have encountered the following claim: New York's City's recently elected socialist mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is actually the secret, biological son of convicted sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Supposed photos depicting Mamdani at various ages, his mother (filmmaker Mira Nair), and Epstein were shared tens of thousands of times, including by prominent right-wing influencers. Sandy Hook conspiracy theorist Alex Jones even posted on X that there was a "major investigation" underway to determine the mayor's parentage. It was all bullshit -- a dumb, AI-fueled conspiracy theory apparently based on an email between a publicist and Epstein that mentioned Nair as an attendee at a promotional screening afterparty for her 2009 film Amelia, which was hosted at the home of Ghislane Maxwell. Mayor Mamdani was born in 1991. The episode laid bare the newest, most rapidly evolving frontier in news misinformation: the collision between the changing manner in which global audiences consume information, and an artificial intelligence revolution that allows any individual to generate increasingly detailed and realistic content in just a few seconds. Nowhere has this been more apparent than throughout the Epstein files saga. For the better part of a year, the Trump administration has attempted to delay, defer, and deny public access to materials related to the case. After being forced to release the files by an act of Congress, the material has been released in dumps of hundreds of thousands, even millions of documents at a time -- including six million of them last week. The onslaught of emails, business logs, photos, testimony, videos, court documents, and personal correspondence has spread coverage of the files so thin that it's near impossible to parse. Adding to the confusion is that those already-muddy waters are being regularly stirred up by AI misinformation slop. In March of last year, researchers debunked a photo purporting to depict Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, actor Tom Hanks, and Epstein's convicted accomplice Ghislane Maxwell on the beach together as AI-generated. In January, a viral audio clip presented as a recording of Trump berating former Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene over her support for the release of the files was actually generated by OpenAI's video generating software Sora. After a tranche of Epstein documents containing mentions of both Trump and former President Bill Clinton, an AI-generated video of Trump patting and kissing Clinton's crotch went viral on several social media platforms. A slew of celebrities, including Oprah Winfrey, former Vice President Kamala Harris, and Open AI CEO Sam Altman have been caught up in the AI slop vortex swirling around the release of the Epstein files. In the case of Mamdani, major conservative figures circulated AI-generated images purporting to show him as an infant on a beach vacation, in his mother's arms, with Epstein looming behind them. Other AI-generated images claimed to show a young Mamdani alongside his mother, Epstein, and other prominent figures named in the files. According to BBC Verify, the latter images seem to have originated from the parody account "@DumbFckFinder." Despite containing an AI watermark, X's AI chatbot Grok told at least one user that the photo was authentic. "Somebody has to say it. There is a very real possibility Zohran Mamdani is Jeffrey Epstein's biological son," a pro-Trump account wrote in an X post with over 2 million engagements and 90 thousand likes. "Grok says this photo of the young future, New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani with Jeffrey Epstein, Bill Gates, Bill Clinton and others is real," Alex Jones wrote in one of his posts. "I'm about to break huge news on this topic in the next few hours." No news was broken, and fact-checking notes later added to his posts clarified that the images had been made "with Google Nano Banana." It's not particularly surprising given the extent to which the Trump administration and the MAGA movement have used generative AI to create the reality they wish existed. The impulse has been particularly visible in Minneapolis, where in just the past few weeks the administration has -- through its official social media accounts -- distributed a manipulated image of lawyer and activist Nekima Levy Armstrong during her arrest, falsely showing her in tears. The Department of Homeland Security, ICE, and Border Patrol regularly share AI-generated content depicting immigration agents as jingoistic -- decidedly nordic looking -- warriors for the motherland. The pattern is repeated across the administration, and Trump's near-daily barrage of Truth social posts and reposts are typically clogged with AI slop depicting him as a king, superhero, or literally dumping shit on his rivals. The integration of AI into the public's interfacing with news events is a multi-front misinformation war on people who just want the news. From Google AI summaries serving up ludicrously incorrect answers to queries, to news outlets publishing fake books and authors after using AI to create a reading list, to the ease with which AI can create newscasts out of thin air or manipulate the image of a news personality into saying something completely fake. There is no need to invent personalities, or connections, or photos related to the Epstein files; the case itself is horrifying enough. The testimonials given by survivors are harrowing, and contain plenty of leads worthy of investigation, as do the now-public communications between Epstein and his wide networks of contacts and associates. The Epstein saga as a whole calls for a sober, independent, detailed investigation into the multiple failures of the American criminal justice system that allowed him and his accomplices to continue abusing young women years after he was publicly known as a predator. No AI hallucination can even begin to imitate those horrors.