Babylon Bee says NM law ‘spoils the joke’

The Babylon Bee is taking New Mexico to court over a state law that requires warning labels on certain AI-generated political content, arguing the mandate threatens political satire by forcing comedians to explain the joke before readers can laugh.

The Christian satire site filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against New Mexico officials, with backing from Alliance Defending Freedom, challenging provisions of House Bill 182, the 2024 law that amended the state’s Campaign Reporting Act to regulate what it calls “materially deceptive media.”

The law requires covered political advertisements that use artificial intelligence to generate or manipulate images, video, or audio to include a prominent disclaimer stating that the content was created or altered by AI.

Supporters of the law have framed it as a safeguard against deepfakes and election misinformation. But The Babylon Bee says New Mexico crossed a constitutional line by dragging satire, parody, cartoons, memes, and political comedy into the disclaimer regime.

The lawsuit argues that the state’s forced label does not merely disclose technical information — it changes the message.

According to the complaint, the disclaimer “alters the content” of the satire by telling viewers upfront that the communication is satirical or parodic, stripping it of its intended effect. The lawsuit puts it more bluntly: HB 182 “spoils the joke as it begins.”

Seth Dillon, CEO of The Babylon Bee, told Fox News Digital the problem is not just about bad comedy policy. It is about compelled speech.

“New Mexico is stuffing words into our mouths,” Dillon said, arguing the state is forcing the Bee to say something it otherwise would not say.

That gets to the heart of the challenge. Political satire works because it imitates, exaggerates, mocks, and surprises. A state-mandated warning label announcing that something is artificially generated or manipulated can defeat the entire point, especially when the audience is meant to understand the absurdity through context.

The Bee recently posted an AI-generated satirical travel advertisement mocking Democratic-run New Mexico and state Supreme Court Justice David K. Thomson, who is on the November ballot. In the parody, an AI-generated Thomson says the court rules “against the Second Amendment, the First Amendment or any other amendment that lets people do things.”

The Bee says it plans to continue producing AI-assisted satire about candidates and ballot questions in New Mexico, but does not want to publish under the state’s required label.

“The concern is real, but we don’t censor ourselves,” Dillon told Fox. “If a joke we want to tell is likely to violate the law, we’ll tell it, anyway — both because we have a right to, and we refuse to do the tyrant’s work for him.”

The lawsuit names members of the New Mexico Ethics Commission, which enforces the challenged provisions, as defendants. The Bee and ADF are asking the court to block enforcement.

ADF Chief Legal Counsel Jim Campbell told Fox that the case is about protecting core political speech.

“The government cannot decide which political speech is allowed,” Campbell said, warning that when officials control acceptable political speech, “dissent disappears.”

The law itself contains a carveout for satire or parody only if the required disclaimer is included. In other words, New Mexico says parody may be safe from violation — but only if the speaker first labels it in the precise way the state commands.

Even New Mexico’s own Democratic officials have acknowledged legal problems with that setup.

When Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed HB 182, she wrote that portions of the legislation were ambiguous and could “pose legal issues.” In July 2025, Attorney General Raúl Torrez issued an advisory opinion concluding the disclaimer requirement for satire and parody was “likely unconstitutional on its face.”

Torrez’s opinion explained that satire and parody, by definition, are not likely to mislead a reasonable viewer into believing they reflect actual facts. Therefore, he wrote, there is insufficient justification for forcing disclaimers on those forms of political expression.

The New Mexico Ethics Commission dismissed the lawsuit in a statement to Fox, calling the pre-enforcement challenge “baseless.” The commission said it has never enforced the AI disclaimer requirements against political parody or satire.

“While the Babylon Bee has a First Amendment right to mock New Mexico,” the commission said, “it does not have a right to extract attorneys’ fees from the State.”

That response may not solve the constitutional problem. A law does not have to be enforced repeatedly before speakers can argue it chills protected speech, especially when fines and legal penalties are sitting on the books.

The case also places New Mexico inside a growing national fight over artificial intelligence, elections, and free speech. States are increasingly trying to police deepfakes and AI-generated campaign content. But the danger, critics argue, is that broad “anti-misinformation” laws can easily become tools for regulating jokes, memes, and dissent.

Alliance Defending Freedom has represented The Babylon Bee in similar challenges in California and Hawaii, where courts ruled against state restrictions on political satire and deepfakes.

The question before the court is not whether voters should know when AI is being used deceptively in politics. The question is whether the government can force political comedians to slap a warning label on satire — even when the warning destroys the point of the speech.

For The Babylon Bee, the answer is simple: government-mandated joke explanations are not transparency.

Message from Jim Robinson:

Dear FRiends,

We need your continuing support to keep FR funded. Your donations are our sole source of funding. No sugar daddies, no advertisers, no paid memberships, no commercial sales, no gimmicks, no tax subsidies. No spam, no pop-ups, no ad trackers.

If you enjoy using FR and agree it's a worthwhile endeavor, please consider making a contribution today:

Click here: to donate by Credit Card

Or here: to donate by PayPal

Or by mail to: Free Republic, LLC - PO Box 9771 - Fresno, CA 93794

Thank you very much and God bless you,

Jim

NM list PING!

I may not PING for all New Mexico articles. To see New Mexico articles by topic click here: New Mexico Topics

To see NM articles by keyword, click here: New Mexico Keywords

To see the NM Message Page, click here: New Mexico Messages

(The NM list is available on my FR homepage for FR member use; its use in the News Forum should not be for trivial or inconsequential posts. Let me know if you wish to be added or removed from the list.)
(For ABQ Journal articles requiring a subscription, you may be allowed a number of free article views.)

My personal view is that AI should not be used to create an apparent dialog by a public figure that is not true. Dems could create one for Trump, here the BB creates one for a state supreme court judge. A parody of a public figure like Saturday Night Live uses is perfectly o.k. but using AI to create words he actually did not say is not.

My personal view is that AI should not be used to create an apparent dialog by a public figure that is not true.

AI isn't the issue here. The New Fentanyl law gives state government a back door to censor parody, jokes, and memes created by humans. The state is going to lose this case and they already seem prepared to lose it.

Not the NM I was born into and my family lived since 1930.

Back then there were great jobs and great schools in that state. Now the democrats infesting from Californiated California have destroyed the great jobs market with their green agenda along with the mining, coal, power, oil and gas industries. And the schools now are fighting Oklahoma as the worst of the entire NATION beating out the traditional worst, Arkan-saw and Mississippi.

While it stays in effect, can we report the major news agencies for reporting fake news without a disclaimer?

If AI generated political content requires labeling as such, then all AI generated content should be clearly labeled as such across the board without exception. There is no compelling reason to single out political content other than it offends politicians... the actual jerks who write and pass laws.

My personal view is that AI should not be used to create an apparent dialog by a public figure that is not true.

I'm inclined to agree, and extend the protection to all people. As AI content generation improves we could face a huge problem of people being misrepresented endlessly. People are already losing their grasp on reality and this would aggravate it. The NM law is clumsy, but the problems are real.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.