Elon Musk stirred the pot yet again this weekend when he reposted a deepfake video of Vice President Kamala Harris on the social media platform X, which he owns. The deepfake, initially labeled as parody by its original uploader, was shared by Musk without the original context, amassing over 128 million views, as reported by Bloomberg. Critics argue that Musk's drive to promote this kind of content casually might muddy the waters between satire and harmful misinformation, particularly close to an important election.

Musk’s conduct has prompted sharp criticism from politicians. Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) voiced her concerns on Threads, warning that if such behavior is left unchecked, X and Musk "will not only be violating X’s own rules, they’ll be unleashing an entire election season of fake AI voice and image-altered content with no limits, regardless of party." This sentiment was echoed in a statement by California Governor Gavin Newsom, who declared his intention to sign a bill that would make creating manipulated content like this illegal, according to The Verge. Musk's flip retort was to cite a fictitious expert, Professor Suggon Deeznutz, to assert that parody remains legal in America.

According to X's policies, the platform prohibits media that has been "significantly and deceptively altered, manipulated, or fabricated," focusing on preventing content that may lead to "widespread confusion on public issues," according to The Verge. Although the original video was marked as a parody, it is the lack of disclosure on Musk's resharing of the video that brings the platform's enforcement of these policies into question.

In one post by Musk (below), the X owner stated, "This is messed up," in reference to a video that alleged to show people stealing ballot boxes in Venezuela. X's own crowdsourced moderation tool debunked the post, as readers added, "Although the source has yet to be verified, it is clear that the boxes being stolen in the video are air con units and not ballot boxes. A look at the original post shows Venezuelans in the comments corroborating this information."

The integrity of X's policy enforcement is not the only issue at stake. With Musk at the helm, skepticism over the platform’s ability to maintain unbiased information during an election cycle has grown. After Musk acquired the company in late 2022, he significantly reduced its trust and safety team, possibly making it all the more challenging to police such content consistently. "Whoever is left to enforce its deepfake policies probably has the toughest job in the tech industry," notes Bloomberg, spotlighting how the social media platform handles accountability given Musk's outsized influence.