Secretary Benson calls for federal, state laws to protect elections at bipartisan U.S. Senate AI Insight Forum

WASHINGTON, DC -- Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson today represented the nation's secretaries of state at U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer's bipartisan AI Insight Forum on Democracy and Elections. At the forum, Secretary Benson shared the ways that Artificial Intelligence can dramatically affect citizens' access to credible information about elections and candidates and put forth practical, bipartisan actions federal and state governments can take to address AI risks.

"As the chief elections officer of a battleground state, I am acutely aware that the biggest threat to election security today is misinformation and disinformation designed to confuse voters and obfuscate the voting process," Benson said. "Artificial Intelligence will amplify and expand exponentially these tactics and their impact. We should expect bad actors, both foreign and domestic, to use AI to divide, deceive, and demobilize voters throughout our country over the next year. Federal and state officials have a responsibility to strengthen election security and combat election interference."

Secretary Benson highlighted five major AI-related challenges for election administrators in 2024: a supercharged ability to create and distribute hyperlocal disinformation; the potential for AI tools to target language-minority voters with misinformation in various languages; increased harassment and threats directed at election officials and poll workers; the inequitable use of AI to purge voter rolls; and a need for increased federal investment to protect state election systems against cyber-attacks.

Link to Benson's full written statement.

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