New York seeks ban on AI-generated images of candidates

NEW YORK - As the use of images created by artificial intelligence explodes, Governor Kathy Hochul of New York announced Jan 11 that she would seek limits on how political campaigns can employ the technology before elections.

Ms Hochul specifically wants to prohibit campaigns from spreading AI-generated images of people, including opposing candidates, without their consent in the 90 days before an election.

The new measures, which Ms Hochul will mention in her State of the State address on Jan 13, would also outlaw the deliberate dissemination of false information about elections, including their date and time.

“It’s easier than ever for bad actors to spread misinformation in critical moments, including those that can decide elections,” Ms Hochul said in a written statement.

“Now is the time to take action and protect our democracy or risk a slippery slope,” she added. “We’re leading the nation in setting strong and sensible standards for AI use in elections, protecting voters across the state.”

Voters across the United States in recent years have been inundated with fake missives, misleading robocalls and computer-generated depictions of candidates meant to cast them in a bad light. In 2024, Keith Wright, a powerful former state Assembly member from Harlem, claimed that an audio clip of him disparaging a former colleague was a deepfake.

And last year, in the New York mayor’s race, the campaign of former Governor Andrew Cuomo released an AI video that depicted Zohran Mamdani – now the city’s mayor – eating rice with his hands. It also suggested that his supporters were criminals who beat their wives, sold drugs and drove drunk.

In one scene, a shoplifter is depicted as a black man in a kaffiyeh; another shows a man on the cusp of beating his partner and then saying: “When a woman is being domestically abused, she finally won’t have to deal with some pesky cop to arrest the abuser.”

The advertisement horrified some supporters and many opponents of Mr Cuomo. His campaign spokesperson said at the time that the video had been “posted in error” and “wasn’t done yet”. Shortly after Mr Mamdani won in November, Melissa DeRosa, one of Mr Cuomo’s top aides, told NY1 that a comedian working for the campaign had made the ad, which was then vetted improperly.

“It was immediately pulled down because it hadn’t been approved,” she said. “It hadn’t gone through the right legal channels, and so that was a mistake, and we acknowledged it.”

Ms Hochul’s proposal, if passed by the state Legislature, would allow people or groups to sue if they see images or information that runs afoul of the new rules. The measures build on an array of recent laws passed in New York and across the country that have forced campaigns to disclose how AI is used by political candidates in the run-up to elections.

With this proposal and others, Ms Hochul has shown a desire to grapple with how new and fast-changing technologies are seeping into the lives of New Yorkers. Last week, she called for new privacy standards that would make it harder for strangers to view, tag or message minors on gaming and social media platforms.

Over the past few years, the governor has plowed more than US$300 million (S$386 million) into AI research and signed bills regulating the use of the technology in the film industry and elections.

In 2025, Ms Hochul threw herself into a fraught and high-stakes debate over how to regulate the safe development of the most-advanced artificial intelligence models.

The fight placed her between those who fear the technology’s destructive potential and the large AI companies that want to keep expanding. Both sides have contributed heavily to the governor’s reelection campaign and sought to influence her views on the topic.

Late last month, Ms Hochul signed a law regulating AI models but insisted on changes that the bill’s sponsors and others felt watered it down. Even so, the new law put New York on par with California as a leader in regulating artificial intelligence. NYTIMES