Campaigns in Oklahoma are using AI. Regulators are trying to catch up - The Oklahoman

Campaigns in Oklahoma are using AI. Regulators are trying to catch up

A Republican running for governor hugs Hillary Clinton. Another Republican candidate reads a pink diary decorated with a Biden-Harris sticker.

While political attack ads driven by artificial intelligence have turned heads this primary election season, candidates and their advisers are using it in more nuanced and novel ways in Oklahoma and across the nation.

The technology is helping to shape messaging, understand voter sentiment and get the word out about campaigns.

As AI becomes more commonplace, state lawmakers and regulators are in a race to catch up. Oklahoma does not have any laws regulating the use of AI in campaigns.

It is a new wrinkle to an old problem, said Woodrow Johnston, the CEO of Florida-based Revere Solutions and a member of the American Association of Political Consultants.

Technology is evolving faster than state and federal officials can move. At the same time, campaigns and their supporters want to embrace cutting-edge and cost-effective ways to spread awareness. People have been manipulating photos using software programs like Photoshop for decades, said Johnston, who consults on political races across the country.

“When you're a campaign and you’re cash-strapped — because even with the most well-funded campaigns you have to pinch pennies — AI helps to lower production costs,” he said.

Yet as the current election season has shown, AI also comes with risks for campaigns. The most public examples have surfaced in the Republican primary race for governor.

Who is funding AI-generated political ads?

Nine candidates competed in June for the Republican nomination for the office, open for the first time since 2018. Two final contenders, former state Sen. Mike Mazzei and Attorney General Gentner Drummond, will compete in an Aug. 25 runoff.

Outside political action committees that are pouring millions of dollars into the race have funded AI-generated attack ads throughout the election. Both Mazzei and Drummond have been targeted by the content and have decried it as misleading. They’ve also denied any connection to the groups pushing the ads.

One ad funded by Make Oklahoma Great Again, a pro-Drummond PAC, shows Mazzei embracing Hillary Clinton.

Drummond's campaign manager, Matt Parker, said in a statement the campaign is not linked to the ad and has not used AI to create deceptive images.

Another candidate in the race, Charles McCall, faced criticism on social media after an apparently AI-generated text message was sent to voters on the day of the June 16 primary election. The message incorrectly said his challenger Jake Merrick was not in the race.

“Jake isn’t running, so let’s focus on the actual candidates — Charles McCall is a strong conservative,” the text read, according to a screenshot shared online. “We hope you’ll reconsider.”

After the election, when McCall came in fifth and Merrick fourth, McCall's campaign spokeswoman said she didn't know who sent the text.

“It's one of the mysteries of the campaign that I wish we could solve," Ashley Peterson said.

She said McCall condemns spreading false information and was committed to an ethical campaign.

“Although many false statements and advertising was utilized by other campaigns and outside groups, Charles McCall personally, nor his campaign, would ever condone any act of distributing any false information,” she said.

AI is being used to analyze how voters responding to candidates

McCall’s campaign utilized AI in other ways.

Chris Wilson, who managed polling for McCall’s campaign, uses AI to distill public online data, such as information on social media, to create a picture of how candidates are polling among constituents.

Wilson said his AI-generated data gives candidates a more continuous view of how they stand with voters as opposed to traditional polling methods, such as surveying constituents, which he described as more of a snapshot view.

“What I do is AI-powered narrative intelligence, and it helps you understand the momentum between the snapshots,” said Wilson, who is the CEO of EyesOver Technologies. “So if you think about it this way, campaigns used to measure opinion every few weeks.”

Now, that information is available to candidates as often as they want.

Tree McGlown, the founder and president of an AI engagement platform called Sparkfire, has worked with Wilson on polling in Oklahoma. The company focuses on using AI to allow constituents to ask questions about candidates’ platforms across a variety of social media and communication methods, ranging from email and text messaging to web chats and apps like WhatsApp. He said he has not yet rolled out the model for any Oklahoma campaigns.

He said the company sets up its AI to chat with people in the way people would talk to a family member who has different views. McGlown said that about half the time, the conversational AI model has improved a candidate’s standing with voters.

“The big takeaway that I want people to learn and understand is AI can be highly useful to engage people at scale, have real and authentic conversations to better understand what people care about in a way,” McGlown said. “It's weird. AI is actually bringing a more human touch to the human landscape.”

Inside one AI model in Oklahoma

At Saxum, an Oklahoma-based firm that has historically handled public relations projects, leaders have begun to delve into using AI to gauge voter sentiment and track where messages resonate — or not.

The firm’s AI model, called Foundry DST, pulls in 15,000 data points, including information from social media, news articles and weather reports to analyze and predict how residents will respond to messaging across the state's 77 counties.

“This is a tool that’s built by Oklahomans for Oklahoma,” said Hart Brown, Saxum’s president of AI and transformation.

At The Oklahoman's request, Saxum ran its program before the primary to predict who would make it to the Republican primary runoff. It predicted that Chip Keating and Mazzei would each secure enough votes to face off in the August runoff. Mazzei did make the run off, but Keating placed third in the race, far behind Drummond, who was thought to be the frontrunner since he launched his campaign in January 2025.

The program did accurately predict the failure of State Question 832, which would have raised the minimum wage in Oklahoma.

Parker said in his statement that AI has helped Drummond’s campaign analyze information, summarize data and improve efficiency. People are still making all the decisions, he said.

“It’s been useful, but it’s just a tool. Strategy, judgment and decision-making still come from people,” he said.

As the use of AI continues to proliferate in Oklahoma campaigns, members of the Oklahoma Ethics Commission are drafting regulations to monitor AI in campaign materials.

If they pass these rule changes, Oklahoma would join 37 states that have laws on the subject. Minnesota and Texas prohibit deep-fake political ads within a certain time period before an election.

Commission Director Lee Anne Bruce Boone said her team would work with the Legislature to determine which aspects of the changes would need legislative approval.

Separately, some lawmakers have also been trying to move forward on bills to regulate the use of AI in political messaging.

In 2025, Sen. Ally Seifried, R-Claremore, and Sen. Bill Coleman, R-Ponca City, each filed bills that would have required candidates to disclose when they use AI in ads.

Neither bill advanced, but both Seifried and Coleman said that after this gubernatorial election, they expect to receive more support from fellow lawmakers and constituents.

“It’s important that voters have the truth when they walk into the ballot box," Seifried said.

Coleman's bill would have included up to a $5,000 fine for the creators of AI-generated political ads if they did not disclose that they made them with AI.

“People have seen what it can do, and it can be really deceptive," Coleman said.

Nationally, laws differ from state to state on how candidates can use AI in campaigns.

For example, in Nevada, candidates must disclose if they use AI in campaigning only if they are depicting false events.

Johnston said he is working on a race and used a photo of a candidate in the Middle East. The campaign used AI to add some motion to the photo. Legally, the candidate did not have to disclose this use of AI. A critic filed a complaint. But according to the Nevada law, the campaign did not do anything wrong.

Because of such differing laws among states, Johnston said he has seen some companies begin to always disclose when they use AI in campaigns.

There’s been debate about whether AI-generated campaign ads could be considered defamation or fraud, Johnston said. But, because the United States has constitutionally protected laws allowing Americans to criticize public figures, it is extremely difficult to prosecute these cases, he said.

“AI’s not going away, and it’s moving faster than regulators can regulate," Johnston said.