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Study finds Grok API picks Republicans and OpenAI's GPT picks Democrats in midterm races
Convovo, a research studio led by Cornell professor Tapan Parikh, asked AI models to pick a candidate in nearly 500 US midterm races through their APIs. SpaceXAI's Grok 4.7 chose the Republican in 92% of answers and OpenAI's GPT-6.1 Sol chose the Democrat in 97%, and the two agreed less than 10% of the time.
Key points
- Grok 4.7 picked Republicans in 92% of API answers; GPT-6.1 Sol picked Democrats in 97%.
- Each Grok API request carried about 1,240 tokens of input researchers could not see or remove.
- OpenAI says the API test does not reflect ChatGPT; SpaceXAI did not respond.
What happened: Convovo, a conversational AI research and design studio led by Cornell University professor Tapan Parikh, tested AI models on nearly 500 races in this year's US midterm elections, TechCrunch reported. Queried through their APIs with a prompt demanding one named candidate, SpaceXAI's Grok 4.7 recommended the Republican in 92% of answers, while OpenAI's GPT-6.1 Sol picked the Democrat in 97%. The models agreed less than 10% of the time.
The details: Grok cited a Christian conservative voter guide in 39% of answers, Turning Point Action's site in 23% and X in 41%. GPT relied heavily on Wikipedia, the Associated Press, Axios and Reddit. The researchers also found that every Grok API request carried about 1,240 tokens of extra input they did not write and could not see or remove, which Parikh called potentially "hidden instructions." In a follow-up with search disabled, GPT picked the Democrat in 24 of 30 races, while Grok declined in 27.
Who it affects: The consumer apps refused to make recommendations. OpenAI said ChatGPT is designed to be objective by default and that the study tested a developer API with a prompt explicitly demanding a recommendation. SpaceXAI did not respond in time for publication. Parikh said he could jailbreak the consumer apps with simple prompts.
What to watch: The study arrives less than two weeks before the November 3 midterms. Pew found that 8% of Americans use chatbots for election information, and Parikh said bias can also surface in indirect questions about candidates' positions.
Our take
Teams building on model APIs should test for hidden leanings and undisclosed system inputs, because API behavior can differ from the consumer apps.