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Democrat Shamaine Daniels is an actual person running for Congress against Republican incumbent Rep. Scott Perry. However, voters in south-central Pennsylvania have started hearing from a non-human representative for the Daniels campaign.
“Hello. My name is Ashley,” the calls reportedly begin, “and I’m an artificial intelligence volunteer for Shamaine Daniels’ run for Congress.”
This is a great move if you trying to reach the segment of the electorate who willingly takes scam calls. It’s also amusing that the AI is called a “volunteer,” when it can’t volunteer for anything. It has no free will, though Ashley might still enjoy better treatment than the real people who work for Kyrsten Sinema.
According to Politico, Daniels’ creepy robocalls “represent the cutting edge of how a new wave of artificial intelligence platforms are shaping politics. Flexible and persuasively human, so-called ‘generative AI’ systems have already been writing campaign letters and drafting automated text messages.”
Here’s an interview with Shamaine Daniels from last year. I’m not sure how an AI is more “persuasively human” than the actual candidate, who’s quite charming. She did lose to Perry in 2022, so perhaps she thinks artificial intelligence can give her an edge in the rematch.
A startup called Civox constructed the “robotic volunteer” and pitched the concept to the first sucker who’d take them up on it Daniels, who apparently welcomed her AI overlords. She said, “This technology is going to change the character of what campaigning looks like.” That sounds like what the creator of a self-aware machine boasts before it goes insane and starts killing everyone.
Answering questions about Daniels’ campaign and her opponent Perry in what Politico describes as a “slightly metallic female voice,” Ashley politely reminds voters that she’s not real but still spectacular.
In test calls to POLITICO, Ashley stayed on-script, repeating Daniel’s biographical information and policy positions — that she’s an attorney who works on affordable housing, economic disparities and progressive policies. When prompted to stray into broader topics, like where to vote, or how much money Daniels was saving with AI calls — it declined to say, responding, “It’s a lot to think about,” and offering to connect the caller with a human campaign staffer.
It’s unclear why Politico is impressed that a machine stayed “on-script.” If Ashley started asking for a human body in a sexy Southern voice, that would be more newsworthy (and terrifying).
Ashley also evaded questions about Perry’s alleged coup attempts in 2020. She just said Daniels has “concerns” about Perry’s efforts to help overturn a free and fair election. AI is famously known for understatement but that’s not the most effective communication tactic for a political campaign.
I should note to Daniels’ credit that Ashley just seems creepy and depressing, but she’s not used for nefarious “deep fake” purposes, like when a Ron DeSantis super PAC had AI fake Donald Trump’s distinctively horrific voice in an attack ad. Or when New York Mayor Eric Adams pretended he could speak Mandarin and Yiddish. Yes, that’s a real thing that happened.
The Associated Press reported in October that Adams used AI to contort his own voice from English into several languages he doesn’t actually speak. He was very proud of this fake-aroo.
“People stop me on the street all the time and say, ‘I didn’t know you speak Mandarin, you know?’” Adams bragged to reporters. “The robocalls that we’re using, we’re using different languages to speak directly to the diversity of New Yorkers.”
The robocalls have been made in Spanish, Yiddish, Mandarin, Cantonese and Haitian Creole. Adams rejected any ethical concerns, which is consistent with his overall character.
“I got one thing: I’ve got to run the city, and I have to be able to speak to people in the languages that they understand, and I’m happy to do so,” he said. “And so, to all, all I can say is a ‘ni hao.’”
So, at least Shamaine Daniels doesn’t have Ashley speaking German. You can always count on Eric Adams to make another politician’s questionable choices look slightly better.
