Overview

A fake newscast used real names and old photographs. Haya Akbik, a former intern for Sherrod Brown, told the Associated Press that claims attributed to her were fabricated, leaving a real person to absorb the reputational cost of a false political video.

A fabricated broadcast borrowed real biographies

An October 28 Associated Press report described videos targeting Ohio candidate Sherrod Brown and Texas candidate James Talarico. One mimicked a newscast and used photographs of Haya Akbik and other former staffers; Akbik said the statements attributed to her were entirely made up.

The clip aimed at Talarico was framed as a former student speaking directly to camera. Dartmouth deepfake researcher Hany Farid assessed the Brown video as a fairly low-tech fake and the Talarico clip as likely AI-generated. The report did not establish a definitive production chain.

Copies survived after the first posts came down

X removed the initial posts and suspended the accounts, yet the AP found copies still online, some with hundreds of shares. Close to an election, recognition and removal can come after a clip has already moved beyond its first point of upload.

The immediate target is not only an abstract information environment. People whose names and photographs are borrowed must deal with searches, retellings and questions prompted by allegations they never made.

Detection leaves the harder question of responsibility

Authenticating a clip is only the first step. A platform can act on an original upload, while reporters and researchers can identify signs of manipulation; the article leaves open whether corrections and context can reach the same audiences as copies that have spread across accounts.

The risk depends not just on whether a model can make convincing video, but on how borrowed identities lend that video credibility. For viewers, checking whether the named person actually made the statement is more dependable than trying to estimate how much AI went into a clip.

Sources read for this article

Associated Press, “Disinformation videos, likely from Russia, are exploiting real people to malign Senate candidates,” page published 2026-10-28 00:15:10 UTC. https://apnews.com/article/midterm-election-disinformation-russia-talarico-brown-c52f2c1720a0bb1ea86545d260aaf969