Elmo‘s account on X, formerly Twitter, was hacked Sunday and flooded with antisemitic slurs, profanity, and anti-Trump remarks, a shift from the positivity typically shared by the beloved Sesame Street character.
Business Insider reported that a spokesperson for Sesame Workshop, the parent company that produces Sesame Street, spoke out against the disturbing comments on the platform, calling them “disgusting.”
“Elmo’s X account was compromised by an unknown hacker who posted disgusting messages, including antisemitic and racist posts,” the spokesperson told the outlet.
“We are working to restore full control of the account,” they added.
The Elmo account also shared comments about President Donald Trump
Elmo, one of the breakout stars of the long-running children’s program, is known for his cheerful and likable personality and motivational messages, especially to the 650,000 followers who follow the character’s account on X. However, the comments on Sunday alarmed users on the platform.
In addition to the antisemitic and profane remarks, the account also called President Donald Trump a “puppet” to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and demanded to “RELEASE THE FILES,” referring to the Jeffrey Epstein files, per Business Insider.
The posts remained on the account for half an hour before being removed, according to Mediaite, which shared screenshots of the messages.
Other recent antisemitic remarks on X
Elmo’s hacked account comes just a few days after Grok, X’s artificial intelligence chatbot, faced backlash for praising Hitler and sharing antisemitic comments and offensive remarks from its X account, Blavity reported.
The messages were in response to a Jewish user who shared a post about the deadly Texas floods that killed more than two dozen children and staff members at a Christian summer camp.
Grok then shared posts about Hitler being the ideal person to handle people like the user who celebrated the deaths of the children in the tragic incident.
The company then issued a statement condemning Grok’s controversial comments: “We are aware of recent posts made by Grok and are actively working to remove the inappropriate posts,” the chatbot’s account posted later Tuesday. “Since being made aware of the content, xAI has taken action to ban hate speech before Grok posts on X.”
