Report: Trump Used Grok to Help Talk Him Into Illegal Invasion of Venezuela

Truthout is a vital news source and a living history of political struggle. If you think our work is valuable, support us with a donation of any size. President Donald Trump was reportedly encouraged by Elon Musk’s AI chatbot, Grok, to carry out his illegal invasion of Venezuela during an hourslong session with the chatbot just weeks before the attack this January. In December 2025, Trump asked Grok questions for hours during a secret visit to the White House by Musk, per new reporting by Time Magazine. Trump asked about his legacy and presidency, and wanted the bot’s input on his planned kidnapping of then-Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Trump was already conducting an illegal boat strike campaign on alleged drug smugglers originating in Venezuela and elsewhere. That month, Trump also began unlawfully seizing Venezuela’s oil tankers. An official present told Time that Trump asked Grok how Venezuelans would feel if he captured Maduro. The bot “responded that Maduro was a repressive and deeply unpopular dictator and that many Venezuelans would likely celebrate his downfall.” Trump was impressed with the answer and thought the bot “was ingenious,” the report said. Chat bots like Grok are known for doling out excessive praise to their users. The illegal invasion killed 100 people, Venezuelan officials reported, including civilians. People in Caracas described the attack as terrifying, with U.S. aircraft dropping bombs “indiscriminately.” A UN expert recently said in a report that the Venezuela invasion and kidnapping of Maduro was a violation of international law that violated the right to life and Venezuela’s sovereignty. The U.S. has since been seizing all of Venezuela’s oil revenues and its oil reserves, robbing the poor country of crucial income as Trump brags about the pilfering. Recent polls in Venezuela have shown deep dissatisfaction with Trump and his installed leadership. Trump has been increasingly enthusiastic about AI. Tech CEOs have clamored to influence him, taking turns praising him at a meeting at the White House this week, as Trump has also sought to praise the industry. At the same time, the Trump administration has been rushing to integrate AI into large swaths of federal operations, including in its warfare. The Pentagon reportedly used Claude, Anthropic’s AI model, in helping to plan the Venezuela operation, and has recently faced scrutiny over its use of AI to rapidly feed soldiers targets in the opening sortie of the Iran war earlier this year — including in the U.S. bombing of an elementary school in Minab, Iran, which killed over 120 children. Recently, reporting found that the U.S. military nearly started a war after preparing a plan to board a ship from China based on a false AI-generated report that claimed that the ship had nuclear bomb-building components. This has not stopped the Trump administration from ramping up its adoption of such technology into regular government affairs, however. On Wednesday, Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth said that Musk and Anduril CEO Palmer Luckey, along with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, will be at the head of a new U.S. military task force known as “Project Meridian.” The goal of the group will be to shape the future of warfare, including developing new weapons for use in combat. In that same speech, Hegseth also said that he is creating a new command, known as the “Autonomous Warfare Command,” which will focus on using AI technology to conduct war autonomously. Media that fights fascism Truthout is funded almost entirely by readers — that’s why we can speak truth to power and cut against the mainstream narrative. But independent journalists at Truthout face mounting political repression under Trump. We rely on your support to survive McCarthyist censorship. Please make a tax-deductible one-time or monthly donation.