Fake AI Image of Georgia Mayor Spreads as Election Deepfake Fears Rise

Motley Broom said the episode was a sad commentary on democracy and political discourse and sought to reinforce tired stereotypes about women in leadership. Six years ago, when she first took office in the Atlanta suburb, a political enemy would have needed at least rudimentary skill with image-editing software to forge such a picture. Today, all that is required is a computer and a prompt for an AI image generator, the report said.

A poll taken in mid-June by Rad Campaign, a digital marketing agency, and Women Who Tech, an advocacy organization for female entrepreneurs, showed that about 71% of respondents worry about AI-generated deepfakes and disinformation affecting elections. Two in three respondents said they were concerned about AI being used to sexualize women. Allyson Kapin, founder of Rad Campaign and cofounder of Women Who Tech, said the findings show Americans are more concerned about AI’s use in deepfakes, election disinformation, and the sexualization of women and children than its impact on jobs or the economy. Concern about deepfake images being used to sexualize women or children, or to influence elections, outstrips concern about AI affecting jobs by about three to one, Kapin said. 'The public is deeply concerned,' she said.

The report cited several examples involving the Trump administration. In January, the White House’s official account on X posted a digitally altered image of Nekima Levy Armstrong, who had been arrested in connection with a demonstration that disrupted church services in St Paul, Minnesota. A picture of her calmly being escorted by a DHS agent was altered so that she appeared to be crying, and her skin had been darkened. Kaelan Dorr, the White House deputy communications director, later described the image as a 'meme.' Fake images of Zohran Mamdami, New York’s mayor, also began circulating from a 'parody' account on X in February, falsely depicting him and his mother in the company of disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein. Reuters used Google’s SynthID tool to debunk the images, but other accounts had already recirculated them as authentic, fueling conspiracy theories.

Senator Raphael Warnock, a Georgia Democrat, said in a video posted to Facebook that deepfake images had been circulating online falsely depicting him with health problems, with an armful of grandchildren he does not have, and with a full head of hair, which he said was funny if problematic. 'As these tools become increasingly powerful, it will get harder and harder to distinguish fact from fiction, and there are already bad actors out there, who are doing everything they can to divide us and confuse us,' Warnock said. 'This has huge implications for our democracy. What if hours before an election, someone created a page with AI, generated images, fake stories about the candidates, how will voters know what’s true, and what’s not true?' Warnock is among a group of Senate Democrats who have been war-gaming political responses to possible election interference scenarios. Chief among those scenarios is disinformation driven by fabricated images or videos circulated through social media.

Outgoing US senator John Kennedy, a Louisiana Republican, offered a bill last week requiring AI firms to install a 'kill switch' for rogue AI. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky blocked Kennedy’s bill, describing the effort as premature without additional industry input. Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic House minority leader, said in an interview earlier this month on SiriusXM that government should move 'urgently' on AI regulations broadly, calling for 'guardrails to protect the American people from bad actors and bad behavior,' and adding: 'It should be a high priority.' Jeffries noted that Republicans attempted to pass legislation preempting states from regulating AI last year, as part of the omnibus One Big Beautiful Bill. The amendment failed on a 99-1 vote in the Senate.

State legislatures are also wrestling with AI regulation amid a widespread, bipartisan public backlash. Some states have legislation like Tennessee’s Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security Act, known as the Elvis Act, which protects politicians and residents alike from AI voice cloning and digital likeness replication. The law uses the state’s robust right-of-publicity protections that are a product of Nashville’s recording industry.