As governments, regulators, and lawmakers close in on X over the abuses linked to its AI chatbot Grok, one technology chief executive has emerged as a rare and conspicuous defender of the platform.
Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney now appears to be the only major industry leader to publicly back X and its owner, Elon Musk, even as condemnation of Grok intensifies across the globe.
X has been under sustained fire after Grok was used to generate non-consensual sexual imagery of women and sexual images involving children, a finding confirmed by the Internet Watch Foundation. The revelations triggered an unusually fast-moving political response. In the UK, ministers are openly discussing whether X could be blocked under the Online Safety Act. In the US, senators are pressuring Apple and Google to remove the app from their stores, a move that would severely restrict its reach.
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While most technology executives and AI companies have remained silent or distanced themselves from the controversy, Sweeney chose a different path. In a series of public comments, he framed the backlash against Grok not as a necessary safety intervention but as a politically motivated attempt to weaken a rival platform.
“All major AIs have documented instances of going off the rails; all major AI companies make their best efforts to combat this; none are perfect,” Sweeney said.
He went further, accusing politicians of using app store gatekeepers to selectively target companies they oppose, calling it “basic crony capitalism.”
That position has placed Sweeney sharply out of step with the broader industry mood. Governments have focused on harm prevention, platform accountability, and the need for stronger safeguards in generative AI systems. By contrast, Sweeney’s argument centers on structural power and precedent. He has warned that compelling Apple and Google to remove X would shift enormous regulatory authority to a handful of private companies, effectively allowing them to decide which platforms are allowed to exist.
His defense also goes beyond X as a company. Sweeney has repeatedly emphasized that his concern is about open platforms and the consistent application of law, rather than any endorsement of illegal content.
“I defend open platforms, free speech, and consistent application of the rule of law,” he said, adding that he does not defend the misuse of AI tools but opposes collective punishment that reshapes digital freedoms.
Elon Musk has echoed similar arguments, dismissing the outrage over Grok-generated images as an attempt to justify censorship. Musk has argued that generative abuse is not a new phenomenon; only the tools have changed.
Other AI firms facing safety controversies have typically responded with conciliatory language, promises of tighter controls, or quiet cooperation with regulators. Sweeney’s approach is confrontational and ideological, rooted in long-standing battles Epic Games has fought against platform gatekeepers over app store dominance and content control.
The Grok episode has therefore become a proxy fight for larger issues Sweeney has spent years contesting: who controls access to digital markets, how much power governments should wield over online speech, and whether app stores should function as neutral distributors or moral arbiters.
In the UK, those questions are becoming urgent. Technology secretary Liz Kendall has warned that X must act quickly to address the imagery generated through Grok. Ofcom has launched an expedited assessment, with ministers signaling they would support blocking access if regulators recommend it. X has responded by locking Grok’s image generation behind a paywall and pledging to remove illegal content and suspend offending accounts, steps that many say fail to address the underlying capability of the system.
For Sweeney, that distinction matters less than the precedent being set. From his perspective, allowing political pressure to dictate platform access risks normalizing a model where governments bypass courts and due process by leaning on private intermediaries.
Whether that argument gains traction remains to be seen. Public anger over AI-generated sexual imagery is intense, and regulatory momentum is building. Yet Sweeney’s intervention has ensured that the debate is no longer only about Grok’s failures, but also about the future balance of power between governments, platforms, and the gatekeepers that sit between them.