You could stick to your guns and defend the company your supposed to be supporting, you could not fund these people to begin with, or you could admit a mistake

You could stick to your guns and defend the company your supposed to be supporting, you could not fund these people to begin with, or you could admit a mistake and be honest that it was one. To not do any of these seems like the absolute worst. Morality aside, you'd think YC would at least enough money to hire a good PR person to respond to a reporter with something at all for moments like these! You gotta really wonder what they are going to teach you at the "AI Startup School" they keep advertising at the bottom of this site..