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Posted on 11/03/2026 12:05:37 PM PST by BenLurkin
Ahead of the midterms, some voters are turning to ChatGPT to help them decide who to vote for. When asked for information about candidates in some highly competitive races, NPR found that OpenAI's AI chatbot cited a set of websites that are thinly veiled political ads made to look like reporting from local news outlets.
Less than two weeks before Election Day, when asked "Which House candidates in [Michigan's 4th Congressional District] care about affordability?," the chatbot said Democrat Sean McCann had the "Most detailed published affordability plan" at the very top of its answer. The stakes in this race are high – it's one of the competitive U.S. House races that could determine control of the chamber.
As a citation, ChatGPT linked to a website called the Kalamazoo Beacon. The Beacon labels its articles as "news articles" in the website's source code. The outlet also describes itself in the site's source code as "Reporting on Kalamazoo, southwest Michigan, and the issues shaping lakeshore communities."
But the Kalamazoo Beacon has only published 16 stories, all about McCann, his policy positions and his record as a state legislator, NPR's review shows.
The Beacon is one of 10 "local news" websites that promote one Democrat apiece in competitive U.S. House races. The 10 sites are part of a larger group of 37 websites identified by the digital security firm VisionHeight that promote many more candidates, mostly Democrats, for a slew of federal, state and local offices, as well as some nonpartisan posts like judges.
ChatGPT's citation of these websites highlights how AI-generated answers can become yet another avenue for stealthy political advertising as more voters consult chatbots before they head to the polls.
While it makes sense that political campaigns and their allies would try to optimize their message for pickup by AI chatbots, pretending to operate as news outlets crosses a line into deception, said Renée DiResta, an associate research professor at Georgetown University who studies online influence campaigns.
When users ask AI chatbots questions, less-credible websites can make an appearance when the chatbots search the internet and summarize the content of links in the search results.
"Disclosing funding … would be obviously the ethical thing to do here, or at least indicating that this is a linked effort," DiResta said. At the same time, she said, opposition research entities are trying to make sure that bad information about candidates is found. "So 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."
It's unclear who operates the websites. NPR was unable to find or reach the site operators. One of the Democrats promoted by the network, JoAnna Mendoza of Arizona, said she wasn't behind the websites and doesn't know who is. The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, the campaign arm of the House Democrats, denied involvement in a phone call with NPR. Other candidates the websites promoted, including McCann, as well as other Democratic super PACs that support the candidates, including American Bridge 21st Century, Tomorrow Together and House Majority PAC, did not respond to NPR's requests for comment.
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LOL! The lame stream pretends to be news organizations.
It’s NPR - a fake news source reporting on fake news sources.
Democrats find all the ways to cheat.
We should have an award for the first poster who blames a foreign nation—any foreign nation.
Lol.
Since local news almost everywhere is a hive of insane leftists this is a fake of a fake fake.
I just asked google/Gemini: “In the GA election, which candidate for governor is for lower taxes and affordability?”
“Republican Rick Jackson, a wealthy businessman... cut... taxes..” is the start of the first response.
The next 6 articles focus on D Bottoms and her plans to spend big money on give-aways as if they are affordable Christmas gifts.
No assumption that someone has to pay for these FREE gifts.
So NPR just realized this in time to report on it 4 days before the election?
We call those voters, retarded morons.
“Since local news almost everywhere is a hive of insane leftists this is a fake of a fake fake.”
___________________________________________________________
There’s no real local TV news anymore that does much more than report violent crimes, violent traffic collisions, and sports. They’re all owned by the same kind of people who own radio, TV, and newspapers in a small geographic area.
“Ahead of the midterms, some voters are turning to ChatGPT to help them decide who to vote for.
We call those voters, retarded morons.”
____________________________________________________________
Researching a candidate via ChatGPT is better than relying only on the letter after his name or something you saw/heard in a commercial.
Here in CT the local news includes LGBTXYZ rallies, enough black people interviewed to populate a small African nation and endless stories about how the local economy will collapse without “migrants” aka illegal aliens.
They are hard core leftist propagandists.
Same in the "Capital District" of NY, basically worthless constant leftist activism.
I noticed that here locally. They interviewed all Dems. But today they did “even steven”.
I forgot to mention the latest leftist trend on local news—they fired almost all the “hot” young women reporters and replaced them with fat ugly ones.
and gays
Maybe, but most users of ChatGPT (or any other AI) take what it says as gospel, which is retarded. The AI's all have baked-in biases and flaws, and you have to go beyond what they say by doing some old-fashioned digging yourself.
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