X Close

Gavin Newsom’s misinformation laws risk more censorship

Disinformation has become a Democratic fixation. Credit: Getty

September 19, 2024 - 1:00pm

California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed three bills this week targeting AI misinformation, but critics argue that the legislation will serve as a Trojan horse for censorship.

“​​I just signed a bill to make this illegal in the state of California,” Newsom posted on social media on Tuesday evening, referencing a satirical video purporting to be a Kamala Harris ad. “You can no longer knowingly distribute an ad or other election communications that contain materially deceptive content — including deepfakes.”

There are already federal laws in place banning the spread of election-related misinformation intended to suppress voting, which have been used in recent years to prosecute Right-wing individuals involved in a robocall scam as well as a man who flippantly claimed in 2016 that Hillary Clinton’s supporters could vote by text. The California laws go further, requiring social media companies to moderate election-related “deepfakes” and take down offending content. Critics say this will force companies to censor aggressively, taking down flagged videos regardless of whether they actually violate the law in order to avoid Government penalties.

One online parody artist has already sued California over the new laws. “Because the bills use undefined and vague statutory language, they grant California broad discretion to determine what constitutes impermissible ‘materially deceptive,’” attorneys in the case argued. “This creates a chilling effect on free speech, particularly for political commentators.”

Their client, Christopher Kohls, created the meme referenced by Gavin Newsom, a satirical Harris ad which included the phrase “I was selected as the ultimate diversity hire […] so if you criticise anything I say you’re both sexist and racist.”

Nathan Leamer, former policy advisor to the chair of the Federal Communications Commission, told UnHerd these new laws present free speech concerns by placing the burden of censorship on social media platforms.“This type of hastily written and flawed bill will only create perverse incentives for platforms to err on the side of caution, censoring and suppressing information, out of concern for being jawboned by the state government,” he told UnHerd. “Policymakers should be looking for tangible examples of harms, not hypotheticals.”

The potential for deepfakes — fake videos of real people created through AI — to impact elections has been the source of much consternation in recent years, but there has been little evidence of such videos having significant impact. Nick Clegg, President of Global Affairs at Meta, recently remarked that it was “striking how little effect AI has had at a systemic level”. Nonetheless, about half of American states have implemented or are considering laws restricting election-related AI content.

The attempt to restrict election deepfakes in California is in keeping with Democrats’ growing interest in disinformation, particularly as a cause of the party’s electoral disappointments. Hillary Clinton blamed Russian disinformation for her 2016 loss, and just this week called for those who spread such disinformation online to be prosecuted. Online disinformation has been a Democratic fixation since the 2016 election cycle, and the party has since created a Counter Disinformation Intelligence Unit.

“Where does this end?” Leamer asked UnHerd, referencing the California laws. “State policing group chats, forwarded emails from my father-in-law or Reddit comment debates?”


is UnHerd’s US correspondent.

laureldugg

Join the discussion


Join like minded readers that support our journalism by becoming a paid subscriber


To join the discussion in the comments, become a paid subscriber.

Join like minded readers that support our journalism, read unlimited articles and enjoy other subscriber-only benefits.

Subscribe
Subscribe
Notify of
guest

17 Comments
Most Voted
Newest Oldest
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Brett H
Brett H
25 days ago

I couldn’t read this. The photo made me feel sick.

Harry Phillips
Harry Phillips
25 days ago
Reply to  Brett H

My thoughts exactly.

If he’s as annoying as he looks, life in Ca. must be grim indeed.

Point of Information
Point of Information
25 days ago
Reply to  Harry Phillips

Really?

As a unremarkable-looking person subject to British dentistry and skincare, when I saw that photo, I thought “I wish I looked that good” – although noted the irony of Newsom (and other CA dwellers) complaining about “deepfakes”. Isn’t that what they already are*?

*For UnHerd commenters who are hard of reading, I’m talking about cosmetic enhancements.

Fafa Fafa
Fafa Fafa
25 days ago

Their superficiality is so deep that it makes them fake.

Allison Barrows
Allison Barrows
25 days ago

What do you mean “risk”? It is blatant, outright censorship. In the United States our First Amendment right to free speech is protected by our Constitution, which also protects our Second Amendment right to protect ourselves from government. Which is, of course, why the Democrats want to do away with both.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
25 days ago

Nearly every anti-Trump ad would, if these laws are serious, land the producers in jail. But of course these aren’t serious laws. They are just more slimeball censorship laws that will only be used against prople who don’t like Harris.

Alex Lekas
Alex Lekas
25 days ago

About the headline: this is not about “risk.” This is about intent and Gavin means to enforce censorship to the maximum degree he can. Govt people are falling over themselves to define, codify, and proscribe “misinformation.”

Graham Cunningham
Graham Cunningham
25 days ago

I bet there’s a been a bevy of “misinformation experts” drafting this legislation. You cannot, in 2024 escape hearing about how we citizens need legislation to protect us from a supposed epidemic of ‘fake news’ and ‘misinformation’. I on the other hand, can think of nothing more chillingly Orwellian than the concept of a misinformation expert. Anyone with a reasonable grasp of the interface between human nature and man’s inherent epistemological limitations could not seriously entertain such a notion without choking on their hubris sandwich. We’re talking about a kind of resurgent Maoism here. https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/take-me-to-your-experts

John Tyler
John Tyler
25 days ago

The bill is not about MISinformation, but DISinformation.

UnHerd Reader
UnHerd Reader
25 days ago
Reply to  John Tyler

Both terms are execerable. Neither term is objective. They are both just cheap veneer to dress up censorship.

Jim Veenbaas
Jim Veenbaas
25 days ago

Yet it is perfectly okay for political parties to artfully edit video clips of their opponent, taking them wildly out of context, and using these in campaign ads. Hmm.

Philip Hanna
Philip Hanna
25 days ago
Reply to  Jim Veenbaas

Good point. This type of crap just ends up being a slippery slope, and more and more things get censored. I live in CA, and Newsom makes me sick.

Philip Hanna
Philip Hanna
25 days ago

I hate this sort of thing. They just assume we are all complete morons who can’t tell a “deep fake” from the real thing. Please stop further blunting our critical thinking skills by removing things that the government feels we are too dumb to figure out on our own.
And for the dummies that do believe deep fakes? There will always be morons, and no amount of legislating will change that.

J Cizek
J Cizek
25 days ago

Combine censorship, and prosecutorial discretion, and what do you have?
Whatever you want . . . who’s to say otherwise.

Martin Smith
Martin Smith
24 days ago

Just has to be said, a cliche I know, but the biggest sources of ‘disinformation’ and ‘misinformation’ are the official ones.

Daniel Lee
Daniel Lee
24 days ago

“Online disinformation has been a Democratic fixation since the 2016 election cycle, and the party has since created a Counter Disinformation Intelligence Unit.”
What the Left accuses you of doing, they’re already doing. Canon.

Michael Clarke
Michael Clarke
23 days ago

One down (part of our Hate Crime Bill) three to go.