AI-aided videos targeting Brown and Talarico likely from Russian network

Voters in Ohio and Texas face a new layer of digital noise in the final days of the midterm election. Two Senate candidates, Sherrod Brown and James Talarico, are targeted by social media videos that experts believe were produced with artificial intelligence and linked to Russia. These clips misuse the names and images of real individuals to spread false narratives about the Democrats.

One video targets Brown, who is running against Republican Sen. Jon Husted in Ohio. The clip mimics a newscast and features photographs of Haya Akbik, a former intern for Brown, alongside other ex-staff members. Akbik stated that any claims attributed to her in the footage are completely made up. She described the use of her name and reputation as a false allegation that harms the senator.

The second video targets Talarico, who is challenging Republican Ken Paxton for a Senate seat in Texas. This clip is framed as a direct-to-camera confession from a former student of Talarico. JT Ennis, a spokesperson for Talarico, said the campaign is facing slander through AI deepfakes and foreign bots. Ennis noted that powerful figures are using these tools to protect their political system.

Media forensics expert Darren Linvill of Clemson University identified the accounts sharing these clips. He found that the same accounts previously shared content from Storm-1516, a Russian network that targeted Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in 2024. Linvill concluded that the new videos are likely products of that same network.

Hany Farid, a Dartmouth College professor who studies AI deepfakes, analyzed the technical quality of the clips. He classified the Brown video as a fairly low-tech fake. He stated that the Talarico video is likely generated by AI and is consistent with previous disinformation campaigns released close to Election Day.

The social media platform X has removed the initial posts and suspended the users who shared them for violating platform rules. However, copies of the videos remained online Tuesday, with some accumulating hundreds of shares. This persistence demonstrates the difficulty of containing disinformation in the final days of an election cycle.

The Russian Embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In past cycles, the embassy has denied interfering in U.S. elections. The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency also did not respond to a request for comment. Akbik said the incident underscores the need for Congress to regulate AI slop on the internet, calling the damage done to her reputation severe.