ChatGPT cited sites posing as local news to boost Democrats

ChatGPT cited a network of 37 websites posing as local newsrooms when NPR asked it about candidates in competitive U.S. House races, according to NPR. Ten of the sites each promoted a single Democrat; another twelve were organized around individual states and covered House, state and local candidates. The chatbot pointed at the network in roughly half of its answers, and in 17 of 19 responses that referenced it ChatGPT cited one of the fake 'local news' outlets specifically. Google's Gemini and search products did not surface the sites.

The network, identified by the digital security firm VisionHeight, has fingerprints that read as built for chatbots rather than readers. All 37 domains were registered on September 15, with 36 of them inside an eight-minute window. Every site also contained a file called llms.txt listing its articles in plain text, a format AI crawlers favor. The Kalamazoo Beacon, posing as a Michigan local news site, published only 16 stories, all about Democratic candidate Sean McCann.

Researchers framed it as a familiar playbook retooled for a new distribution channel. 'There's nothing new under the sun,' Clemson's Patrick Warren told NPR. Georgetown's Renée DiResta said the laundering is the point: 'Disclosing funding … would be obviously the ethical thing to do here, or at least indicating that this is a linked effort.' She added that 'there really is this competition for curation, and it's going to have interesting ramifications as the frontier companies themselves try to figure out how to get better at not falling for it.'

Chatbots lean on questionable sources most where credible local coverage is thin, a dynamic researchers call a 'data void.' OpenAI spokesperson Nate Evans told NPR that 'ChatGPT's search tools cite from a range of sources.' Google said it detected policy violations and took 'swift action.' No one has claimed the operation: the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee denied involvement, and the candidates and supporting PACs did not respond.