Ranking member Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., talks with the media before Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent testified during the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee hearing titled “The Financial Stability Oversight Council’s Annual Report to Congress,” in Dirksen building on Thursday, Feb. 5, 2026.
Tom Williams | CQ-Roll Call, Inc. | Getty Images
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) is demanding to know why the Trump administration pressured European allies to relax regulations that would hold big tech companies accountable for enabling child sexual exploitation online.
In a letter on Wednesday to U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer, Warren called out the trade office for threatening countries throughout Europe with tariffs after they initiated formal investigations into Elon Musk’s xAI and its Grok image generator. A version of Grok released last year resulted in the online spread of millions of sexually explicit deepfakes.
“The White House’s trade negotiations appear to be focused on securing advantages for the President and his tech billionaire friends, rather than delivering the new manufacturing jobs and balanced trade he promised American families,” wrote Warren, a member of the Senate Finance Committee and its subcommittee focused on trade.
The National Center on Sexual Exploitation (NCOSE), in a report on Tuesday, identified X, owned by xAI, and Grok as two of the biggest contributors to online sexual exploitation of kids in 2026. The group also put Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg at the top of its “Dirty Dozen” ranking, a list of entities that it says profit from sexual exploitation.
Warren said in her letter that big tech companies have been receiving exemptions from many of the Trump administration’s tariffs, which roiled markets last April, when they were first introduced in sweeping fashion. Meanwhile, Warren wrote, President Donald Trump “has used the tariffs to bully other countries into abandoning their regulations countering Big Tech abuses.”
Warren is seeking records from the USTR indicating whether it’s communicated with officials working on behalf of Musk’s businesses seeking to “oppose or undermine content moderation policies,” and whether USTR officials have heard from industry executives or lobbyists on the matter.
SpaceX, Musk’s aerospace and defense company, recently acquired xAI. The company is expected to soon file paperwork for an IPO that could be the largest in history.
WATCH: California AG launches investigation into xAI, Grok
