Political campaigns will spend nearly $12 billion on the midterm elections this year, making this the most expensive political advertising cycle in American history. Within that flood of spending, nearly 200 political ads generated or enhanced with AI have already run, and most don’t disclose that their images are computer-generated.

• Is that legal? The legal framework governing political advertising is almost entirely about disclosure, not accuracy. Of all the ads on television, official candidate ads face the least regulation for truthfulness. In the U.S., local TV stations are legally prohibited from censoring or altering any ad from a legally qualified candidate. That means stations can’t be held liable for libel, defamation, or false claims in those ads; the candidate or the campaign remains directly liable.

• PAC ads (where no candidate says “I approve this message”) operate under a different standard, but not because PACs are required to be truthful. Stations can reject PAC ads, and because they can, they also share legal liability if they air something defamatory. In the U.S., no government agency regulates the truthfulness of political claims.

• As for AI, there is currently no federal law requiring disclosure of AI-generated content in political ads. Thirty-one states regulate political deepfakes, but only three ban them. The best way to tell whether an ad is using a fake version of a candidate’s opponent: the person on screen says something out of character with their known positions.

• The money at stake is huge. Political advertising is expected to top $4 billion in local broadcast TV revenue this year. For many local TV stations, particularly those in competitive midterm markets like Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and New York, political advertising may be the difference between a profitable year and a loss. On YouTube, Hulu, Peacock, and Tubi, political ads reach specific voters by ZIP code, viewing history, and demographics. But streamers aren’t bound by the no-censorship rules that apply to broadcasters, so they can and do reject or remove political ads that violate their policies.