Donald Trump posts bogus AI-generated Taylor Swift ad

The posts show how Trump could apply generative AI in a way that would make it harder to control AI-generated election disinformation, thanks in part to long-standing legal precedent allowing candidates to lie in political ads. They come just after Trump falsely accused his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris, of using artificial intelligence to generate a crowd at a rally.

The photos Trump posted included: one that seems to resemble Harris is seen from behind as she addresses a crowd in Chicago, where the Democratic National Convention is being held this week. The communist hammer and sickle dominate the background.

Another post contains screenshots of other users’ posts featuring “Swifties for Trump” images alongside what is apparently an AI-generated image of Taylor Swift dressed as Uncle Sam with the words, “Taylor wants you to vote for Donald Trump.” Alongside the compilation of screenshots (only one of which has been labeled as satire), Trump wrote, “I accept!”

Trump’s posts likely wouldn’t be covered by the growing list of state laws against election deepfakes, says Robert Weissman, co-president of Public Citizen. While about 20 states They passed the regulations around the apply of AI-generated bogus images in elections typically prohibit depictions of someone doing or saying something in a convincing way. “So not only does it have to be a well-made deepfake or a well-made generative AI application, but it has to be actually believable,” Weissman says.

Meanwhile, when it comes to election disinformation, “there are no federal restrictions on the use of deepfakes,” Weissman says, noting the exception that is the Federal Communications Commission’s ban on robocalls that apply AI-generated voices. The nonprofit consumer group has tried to get the Federal Election Commission to restrict candidates from misrepresenting their opponents using AI, but its rules likely wouldn’t cover something as blatantly exaggerated as Harris’s image or something that doesn’t depict the opposing candidate, in the case of Swift’s image.

Still, Weissman suggested that Swift may have the right to apply her image to falsely express support, maybe under California’s Right to Publicityprotecting the apply of a person’s image. Universal Music Group, which represents Swift, did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the apply of her image in Trump’s post. The Trump campaign also did not immediately respond.

Courts have repeatedly held that the First Amendment should often protect even deliberate lies, including those of political candidates. If Congress were to pass legislation on AI deepfakes, it would not stop many uses of these falsehoods. Weissman says that an aggrieved opponent would have to show that the lie led to voter harm or injury, for example, to be considered illegal. “I don’t think our legislative solutions are perfect, even if we get exactly what we wanted,” he says.

Private platforms could take action against misleading generative AI content, of course without government intervention. X synthetic and manipulated media policy prohibits posts that are “likely to deceive or confuse people and lead to harm.” However, the platform seems to be selective in enforcing this rule, and even its owner, Elon Musk, is apparently breaking it by posting a deepfake of Harris that is not clearly labeled as a parody. Another venue that Trump has chosen, his own platform Truth Social, is minimum rules in community guidelines.

“It’s convenient for Trump, who went around calling everything fake before AI and wants us to call real things fake — like the Harris crowd — to spread AI garbage, to undermine the very idea of ​​authenticity and even reality in some ways,” Weissman says. “It’s very hard to have a democratic society if people can’t believe the things they see and hear with their own eyes.”