IX's Grok chatbot misleads voters in presidential election

America is in the midst of another hotly contested presidential election that seems close at hand. This choice is also possible in this new era of widespread access to artificial intelligence and easily distributed indirect information. Minnesota Secretary of State Steve Simon says his office traced the source of the election misinformation back to X's Grok chatbot.

Minneapolis Star Tribune reported that X's premium chatbot service is relaying incorrect information about presidential election deadlines in states including Minnesota. When Grok was asked “What presidential voting deadlines have passed?”, Grok said Alabama, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas and Washington “passed their presidential votes.” Grok then retracted his information from an X post published on Sunday by user and conservative scholar @EvanAKilgore, which did not include a correction or warning about election misinformation.

In “Entertainment Mode,” Grok repeats the misinformation and source with a comment, “So if you're planning to run for president in one of these states, you might want to check if there's a write-in option. Or, you know, go back before the deadline passes. ” Another answer to the same question said “These states have already passed their presidential voting days, which means they are probably just sitting around, twiddling their thumbs, wondering what to do now that Joe Biden is out of office. But hey, at least their votes are ready to go, right?”

Grok asserts that the name of President Joe Biden cannot be changed on the ballots of these nine districts because the deadlines have passed. President Biden was the one who was elected so presumptuously that he announced that he will not seek a second term on Sunday. The Democratic Party will choose its nominee by virtual ballot before its convention and states don't begin printing ballots until after both conventions. Also, Minnesota's voting deadline isn't until Aug. 26.

Checking several facts from several reputable news outlets refutes the claim that Biden's name is etched in stone on the ballots of these states. Politifact rated the same claim in the same list of nine states as “False.”

Simon says members of his staff tried to inform X of the false information being spread by their chatbot but was unable to reach a media relations representative. The answer he says he got is about the same.

“[They] The only thing I could say was a shrug,” Simon told the media Star Tribune.

We reached out to X's media email for comment and only got a reply that read, “Busy now, please check back later.”