WASHINGTON – Today, Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Chairwoman of the Senate Committee on Rules and Administration with oversight over federal elections, and Congresswoman Yvette D. Clarke (NY-09) sent a letter to the CEOs of Meta Platforms, Inc. and X Corp., Mark Zuckerberg and Linda Yaccarino, respectively, seeking information on how their organizations are addressing AI-generated content in political advertisements hosted on their social media platforms.
“As we approach the 2024 elections, we write to express serious concerns about the emerging use of artificial intelligence (AI)-generated content in political advertisements on your platforms and request information about your efforts to address these threats to our free and fair elections. With the advancement of AI technologies, it has become increasingly challenging to identify AI-generated content, including videos, images, audio, and text. We are already seeing examples of deceptive AI-generated content in political ads that has the potential to deceive voters and disrupt their trust and faith in our elections,” the members wrote.
“With the 2024 elections quickly approaching, a lack of transparency about this type of content in political ads could lead to a dangerous deluge of election-related misinformation and disinformation across your platforms – where voters often turn to learn about candidates and issues.”
The text of the letter is available here.
As Chair of the Rules Committee, Senator Klobuchar has worked on a bipartisan basis to safeguard our elections and strengthen democracy.
In May, Klobuchar and Clarke introduced the REAL Political Ads Act to require a disclaimer on political ads that use images or video generated by artificial intelligence. The Senate bill is cosponsored by Senators Cory Booker (D-NJ) and Michael Bennet (D-CO).
In September, Klobuchar held a Senate Rules Committee hearing titled, “AI and the Future of our Elections,” highlighting the need to address the risks posed by AI to our democracy. Earlier in September, Klobuchar and Senators Josh Hawley (R-MO), Ranking Member of the Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law; Chris Coons (D-DE), Chair of the Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Intellectual Property; and Susan Collins (R-ME), Vice Chair of the Appropriations Committee and former Chair of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, introduced the Protect Elections from Deceptive AI Act, bipartisan legislation to ban the use of artificial intelligence (AI) to generate materially deceptive content falsely depicting federal candidates in political ads to influence federal elections.
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