Federal district Judge John Mendez granted Christopher Kohl’s motion for preliminary injunction to stop California’s enforcement of the deepfake election law AB 2839.
As we discussed earlier, this law attempts to regulate deceptive media in advertisements), an urgency measure expands the timeframe in which a committee or other entity is prohibited from knowingly distributing an advertisement or other election material containing deceptive AI-generated or manipulated content. The bill also expands the scope of existing law to prohibit materially deceptive content of elected officials, candidates, elections officials and others, authorizing them to file a civil action to enjoin the distribution of such material.
The court held that Kohls had a likelihood of success on the merits that the law facially violated the First Amendment.
