xAI sues Minnesota over state’s anti-nudification law, citing First Amendment concerns

xAI has filed a lawsuit against Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison challenging a state law passed in May that broadly targets AI tools capable of generating or editing nude images, including xAI’s Grok Imagine feature. The law, which is scheduled to take effect on August 1, prohibits allowing people to “access, download, or use” nudification technology and creates a civil cause of action for individuals as well as civil penalties of up to $500,000 per violation sought by the attorney general.

In the complaint, xAI argues the law is unconstitutionally overbroad because it imposes liability even for consensually generated images, content with artistic or humorous intent, or images of adults that are merely suggestive. The company contends the statute violates the First Amendment by failing to narrowly target harmful speech and by attaching strict liability for user actions, even when the company has deployed state-of-the-art controls to prevent violations.

xAI also asserts that existing federal and state laws, such as the TAKE IT DOWN Act, already address the nonconsensual dissemination of intimate images, making the Minnesota law redundant and unconstitutional. The lawsuit claims these existing statutes are written in a constitutional manner, while the new Minnesota law is not.

The timing of the lawsuit, filed just days before the law’s effective date, raises questions about xAI’s prior assessment of the law’s applicability to its services. The complaint does not dispute the state’s interest in preventing nonconsensual pornography but argues the means chosen are impermissibly broad and content-based, which triggers heightened scrutiny under the First Amendment.