Godlewski Talks Artificial Intelligence with Chippewa Valley Residents

Wisconsin Secretary of State Sarah Godlewski joined State Representatives Jodi Emerson and Lisa Subeck for a roundtable discussion on artificial intelligence with Chippewa Valley residents last week.

Those attending the roundtable expressed a wide range of concerns surrounding the expansion of AI, including how the technology is impacting education and how to protect against AI-powered scams. Following the roundtable, Secretary of State Godlewski shared her thoughts on the need for safeguards on the use of artificial intelligence.

"Whether you are a parent with kids or you're someone who has aging parents, AI and regulation I think is top of mind," she said. "We're seeing scammers that are taking $1.2 billion a year from Wisconsin families. Well Tom Tiffany is in Washington making sure that we don't put safeguards in place to actually protect our families. And so for us, it's having that conversation here in Wisconsin to see what's keeping you up at night. Whether it's the big tech and the scams that they are doing, to how do we keep our kids and our seniors safe."

Godlewski also expressed specific concerns regarding the use of artificial intelligence in political advertisements, highlighting a number of social media posts by Congressman Derrick Van Orden over recent months that featured AI videos of his Democratic opponent Rebecca Cooke.

"To me I think this is front and center," she said. "We need to make sure folks know, for example, there's disclaimers on political ads when you are actually not being truthful about your opponent. Whether it's what they say or how you're posing fake images about them, I mean this is really scary. This is one of the reasons why I think Wisconsinites are worried when they see this kind of rhetoric. Because they don't know what's real or not. And Derrick Van Orden is part of that problem, because he's not willing to disclaim that he's actually using AI to create mis- and disinformation about people and that's dangerous."

Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley and Secretary of State Godlewski will face off with Republican Congressman Tom Tiffany and former Mayor of Lancaster David Varnum to be Wisconsin's next Governor and Lieutenant Governor respectively.