Wesleyan: $187M on AI Midterm Ads, 90% From GOP, 27% Disclose

Political advertisers spent $187 million this cycle on nearly 300 ads that were generated or enhanced by AI, up from less than $50,000 in 2024. The Wesleyan Media Project, whose analysis CNBC published the day before Tuesday's midterm vote, says the figure is "almost certainly an undercount" because "so many ads don't contain disclaimers and because determining AI use is difficult in some instances."

More than 90% of that spending came from Republican candidates, party committees or GOP-leaning groups. About 27% of the tracked ads carried any form of AI disclosure; roughly 70% carried none at all. At least $38 million went to ads that strongly appear to include AI imagery despite featuring no disclosure, CNBC reported.

The regulatory map is patchy. There is no comprehensive federal law governing how AI can be used in political ads, or how it must be disclosed. Thirty-one of fifty states require some form of disclosure, and Maryland, Minnesota and Texas have banned some deepfake ads outright.

Enforcement defaults to the platforms, and each has picked a different line. Meta in June added an "about this ad" tool for ads it detects were made with third-party AI tools, and requires disclosure when a political or social-issue ad contains a photorealistic image or video, or realistic-sounding audio created or altered using AI or other digital methods. YouTube told CNBC it applies "prominent labels to realistic AI content" and requires advertisers to disclose synthetic or digitally altered people or events in election ads. X permits political campaigning ads in the United States, but advertisers must obtain certification before running them, and political ads must also comply with applicable disclosure laws.

The term slopaganda, CNBC notes, dates to early last year, when a group of AI experts used it in a paper to describe a new phenomenon combining generative AI slop with propaganda and misinformation. It's the 22nd entry in our deepfakes tracker since early August.