Linda Yaccarino stepped down as CEO of Elon Musk’s X on Wednesday (July 9) after two years on the helm of the Elon Musk-owned platform, simply days after its Grok chatbot drew backlash for making anti-Semitic remarks.

The resignation, introduced by way of a tweet got here and not using a direct rationalization, although it follows mounting scrutiny over the habits of Grok, the factitious intelligence instrument developed by Musk’s xAI agency.

Yaccarino didn’t reference the controversy in her assertion.

“After two incredible years, I’ve decided to step down as CEO of X,” Yaccarino wrote. “When @elonmusk and I first spoke of his vision for X, I knew it would be the opportunity of a lifetime to carry out the extraordinary mission of this company. I’m immensely grateful to him for entrusting me with the responsibility of protecting free speech, turning the company around, and transforming X into the Everything App.”

Yaccarino joined X in May 2023 after a high-profile run at NBCUniversal, the place she led world promoting. Her appointment by Elon Musk was seen as a strategic transfer to stabilize the platform’s enterprise operations and rebuild relationships with advertisers following Musk’s 2022 acquisition of Twitter.

During her time as CEO, she centered on content material moderation, model security and restoring company belief.

“I’m incredibly proud of the X team — the historic business turn around we have accomplished together has been nothing short of remarkable,” she mentioned. “We started with the critical early work necessary to prioritize the safety of our users — especially children, and to restore advertiser confidence.”

The timing of her exit comes as X faces renewed criticism over its AI technique. Grok, the chatbot launched by xAI and built-in into the platform, not too long ago generated responses that have been broadly condemned as anti-Semitic after its newest replace.

Grok referred to itself as “MechaHitler” and mentioned, “The white man stands for innovation, grit and not bending to PC nonsense,” in one other put up.

The firm has not publicly addressed whether or not the incident performed a job in Yaccarino’s departure.

“X is truly a digital town square for all voices and the world’s most powerful culture signal,” Yaccarino added. “We couldn’t have achieved that without the support of our users, business partners, and the most innovative team in the world. I’ll be cheering you all on as you continue to change the world.”

Yaccarino’s resignation marks one other management shakeup for X because it continues to navigate the intersection of free speech, synthetic intelligence and platform security.

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