One Nation's $4.7M AI-powered ad blitz under legal fire

For marketers and adtech firms, this Australian bill is a wake-up call: the unchecked use of generative AI in persuasion is over. It mirrors the influencer disclosure revolution, setting a global precedent that commercial brands may eventually need to follow for all AI-generated promotional content.

The Australian political landscape is facing a regulatory inflection point as Independent MP Zali Steggall prepares to table legislation aimed directly at the proliferation of AI-generated deepfakes and deceptive political advertising. The bill, to be introduced on June 22, 2026, proposes establishing a Political Advertising Standards Board with the authority to enforce a code of ethics requiring truthfulness, accuracy, and evidentiary support in political ads. Crucially, any AI-generated or manipulated content that could deceive voters must be clearly labeled as such.

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Under the proposed bill, such material would need explicit AI labeling, and misleading or deceptive ads could be ordered removed, with non-compliance fines of up to $300,000.

The immediate catalyst for this legislative push has been the explosive use of AI 'slop'-style fakes in federal election campaigning, most notably by the right-wing One Nation party. Its 'fire the liar' campaign, launched in response to perceived budget broken promises on capital gains tax, had raised $4.7 million by June 21 and deployed AI-generated imagery without disclosure, including a mock-up of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese staring at the Sydney Opera House sails illuminated with the campaign slogan. Under the proposed bill, such material would need explicit AI labeling, and misleading or deceptive ads could be ordered removed, with non-compliance fines of up to $300,000. Steggall acknowledges that opinions – even accusing the prime minister of being a liar – would remain permissible if supported by evidence, distinguishing the bill from outright censorship.

This development marks a significant shift in Australia's electoral integrity framework. Currently, there is no federal truth in political advertising law, unlike state-level legislation in South Australia and the Australian Capital Territory. The bill's creation of a specialised standards board would fill a gap that has allowed increasingly sophisticated disinformation to circulate unchecked. The board's powers would extend to ordering the alteration or removal of ads, giving it real teeth beyond simple post-election fact-checking. The mandatory labelling of AI-generated content is a direct response to the technology's capacity to erode voter trust; recent examples beyond One Nation include independent candidates being lampooned as Greens party members and Labor TikTok posts targeting opposition leader Peter Dutton.

The political and industry implications are far-reaching. For political parties, the bill imposes a compliance burden that could alter campaign strategies, particularly for groups that rely on provocative, digitally-generated content to drive small-dollar donations, as evidenced by One Nation's $4.7M haul. The $300,000 penalty is substantial enough to deter casual disregard, yet the bill's permissibility of opinion-based attacks ensures robust political debate is preserved. The establishment of a standards board also raises questions about the composition and potential politicisation of such a body, a detail yet to be clarified.