A few weeks ago, a video popped up on YouTube, purporting to be a verbal clash between Sen. Josh Hawley, a Missouri Republican, and Gov. Gavin Newsom during a congressional hearing.

The video claimed that Hawley cleaned Newsom’s clock in their debate over a lawsuit that Newsom had filed. The problem is it was fake, created with video snippets of both politicians and a voiceover describing what supposedly happened.

The video, which has since vanished from YouTube, is a fairly crude example of how technology can be manipulated to depict seemingly real events.

More sophisticated examples of artificial intelligence, known as deepfakes, can literally put words in political figures’ mouths or even create seemingly real persons.

Last year, Christopher Kohls, going by the name “Mr. Reagan” on

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