A A few weeks ago, Donald Trump decided it would be funny to accuse US Vice President Kamala Harris of using AI in images showing a large crowd greeting her at the airport. “Did anyone notice that Kamala CHEATED at the airport?” Trump tapped furiously on his phone. “There was no one at the plane and she did it using an AI (…) She should be disqualified because creating a fake image is ELECTION INTERFERENCE. Anyone who does something like that is cheating at EVERYTHING!”

Just as some animals are more equal than others, some politicians are more honest. When the former president himself posted an obviously AI-generated image this week of what looks like the back of Harris’ head in front of a massive communist crowd with a giant hammer and sickle spread out above it, he presumably didn’t consider it election interference. Trump has also recently shared AI-generated images of himself, Elon Musk and Taylor Swift.

These images are concerning – especially since most image generators have taken protections against creating content with real people. But it seems that Trump is not trying to pass the images off as real: I think he is trying to funny.

Someone on the Trump campaign team learned how to use an AI image generator and became a bit prompt. A strange video of Trump and Elon Musk dancing together is not exactly an example of the kind of election manipulation by deepfake media that many disinformation commentators worry about. It Is an example of a candidate desperately trying to stay in your algorithm. AI generation requires only a few prompts and possibly a paid subscription to a generator. It’s much cheaper and faster than hiring creatives who have to spend time developing and creating ideas before anything is ready to publish.

AI-generated images and deepfakes are the poor man’s meme. Truly successful memes – humorous content designed to be shared online – are created by people who have adopted the language and culture of the internet and know how to inject zeitgeisty themes into social media posts designed to resonate and go viral. Combining text with images or video is a subtle art that Harris’ campaign team has mastered well. Everyone on the internet knows the coconut tree, and anyone who is constantly online knows Charli xcx’s accolade that “Kamala IS a brat.”

In contrast, the AI ​​posts Trump has shared aren’t great internet humor, but cheap algo fodder. One trick he’s also tried is combining AI images with real ones to give them more credibility, or maybe just to sharpen the comedy potential. In his post, where he writes “I accept!” alongside images suggesting Swifties are “turning to Trump,” he paired a real photo of a woman in a “Swifties for Trump” t-shirt with a satirical AI compilation of fans wearing t-shirts with the same slogan and an AI-generated image of Swift as Uncle Sam with the caption “Taylor wants you to vote for Donald Trump.” It’s the kind of content your family’s misguided uncle might forward you, which he in turn got from his buddy because he had nothing better to do.

Trump doesn’t expect or need Swift’s support, and so the humor lies in the disbelief. Posts like this aren’t really meant to convince audiences that Swift supports him; it’s about making sure the intravenous drip of content into his supporters’ Facebook groups and WhatsApp conversations never runs dry. Trump has also always been a hype guy. He knows Swift’s fans would react angrily to his post. He also knows that such outbursts of anger give his content a boost in Truth Social and X’s algorithms—and get him attention in the mainstream media. When people point fingers at him for posting such content, some see it as a sincere fight against misinformation, but to his fans, it looks like they don’t get the joke. (Of course, it’s easier to get jokes when they contain at least a measly crumb of decent humor.)

The idea that Harris is a communist, that Trump and Musk are dance buddies, and that even Swifties can’t escape the Trump fanbase fits the narrative of popularity, relatable lightheartedness, and prestige that Trump is so fond of courting. The narrative is far more important than the truth, especially in the U.S., where political ideology is so powerful that it was one of the most important factors in determining whether or not someone would take the Covid-19 vaccine. Trump’s AI posts are best understood not as outright misinformation – meant to be taken at face value – but as part of the same heady mix of real and false information that has always characterized his rhetoric. Trump is not interested in telling the truth; he is interested in be Truth – as do his most ardent followers. In his world, AI is just another tool to achieve this. Whether he’s willing to accept the reality that he can’t make or understand jokes is another story.

• Sophia Smith Galer is a journalist, content creator and author of Losing It

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