These are just two of at least 220 campaign ads using AI-generated content this election cycle, according to the Wesleyan Media Project, which tracks political advertising. More than $137m has been spent airing such ads.
IN ONE ADVERT James Talarico , the Democratic Senate candidate in Texas, is depicted wearing a dress and singing about transgender children to a tune from “The Sound of Music”. In another Abdul El-Sayed , the Democratic Senate candidate in Michigan, appears to be playing a board game and laughing at cards that read “Death to America” and “Celebrate 9/11”.
Beneath the surface, though, artificial intelligence is disrupting the art of campaigning in more subtle ways. Candidates are using the technology to help them canvas more effectively, sift through voter data and craft custom messages. The most boosterish insist the technology provides a decisive advantage for campaigns. Others fret that what few ethical restraints remain are being shoved aside.
A recent survey by the American Association of Political Consultants (AAPC), a trade body, found that 83% of campaign strategists and political consultants regularly use AI for their work.
Mr El-Sayed shelled out $170,000 to Daisychain, a company which offers an AI-powered platform that engages in personalised conversations with voters over text messages. The AAPC found that at least 38% of voters had received election information from an AI search summary. Of the $137m spent on AI ads, 88% has come from Republican campaigns and aligned groups.
AI is changing how campaigns communicate with voters. Out on the trail, the progressive group Swing Left is taking a different approach, supercharging old-fashioned door-knocking with AI. Its volunteers record voice memos summarising conversations with voters. AI software then analyses hundreds of these recordings to help campaigns tailor their messages. The technology is a boon for smaller campaigns on tight budgets. Saikat Chakrabarti, an unsuccessful Democratic House candidate in California, had three staffers use AI to code replacements for virtually all the campaign’s paid software, from voter-outreach apps to website-design tools. Such efficiencies allow campaigns to focus on what matters most, argues Eric Wilson of the Centre for Campaign Innovation, which encourages conservative campaigns to experiment with new technology. “The AI lets us do more of that than the boring, busy work. All this is happening as AI increasingly shapes how voters learn about candidates. Campaign websites, for example, are increasingly designed to be scrapable by AI agents. Even adding information to a candidate’s profile on Ballotpedia, a sort of Wikipedia for election wonks, can affect the output of AI chatbots. But voters beware: a study published by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a think-tank in London, found that leading chatbots gave wrong, incomplete or outdated answers to over a quarter of basic questions about the midterms. That has heightened fears the election will be marred by misinformation. VisionHeight, a cybersecurity firm, recently uncovered dozens of apparently AI-generated websites masquerading as local newspapers, designed to trick chatbots into pumping out favourable coverage of certain congressional candidates. Even more brazen are the deepfakes. A Russian disinformation network, for example, is thought to be behind a series of videos in which a supposed former student falsely accuses Mr Talarico of sex crimes. Voters may disagree. Any complaints they have may soon be fielded by artificial intelligence.
“AI gives us a much better ability to understand the idiosyncrasies of a voter,” says Yasmin Radjy, Swing Left’s executive director. “The core of what a campaign is about, which is connecting with voters, is still a people business,” he says. So candidates are rushing to influence what chatbots say about them—a tactic dubbed “sloptimisation”. Elsewhere, attack ads depict Democratic candidates saying things they never said, sometimes without clear disclaimers that they are AI-generated. Concerns about such spots are overblown, says Mr Wilson, likening them to political parody.
