Majority Leader Schumer Floor Remarks Urging The House To Quickly Move On The Senate-Passed DEFIANCE Act To Combat The Spread Of Sexually Explicit Deepfakes

Washington, D.C. – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today spoke on the Senate floor on the unanimous passage of the DEFIANCE Act in the Senate earlier this week, and urged the House to move quickly to save people from the harms of AI-generated “deepfakes.” Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks, which can also be viewed here:

This week, the Senate passed the DEFIANCE Act, a bill to combat the spread of sexually explicit AI-generated deepfakes. And we also passed another act on fentanyl, which I’ll get to in a minute. But these bills, as I said, passed late in the evening Tuesday, but they deserve significant attention.

AI plays a bigger role in our lives than ever before, and while it has many, many benefits, it’s also easier than ever to create sexually explicit deepfakes without a person’s consent. These fake explicit images can ruin a person’s life, especially if you are a child or a teenager. They can circulate online for years, if not forever, with no or little recourse to hold abusers accountable.

And make no mistake about it. This is not a fringe problem. Ninety percent of deepfake videos are nonconsensual, and 2023 saw more deepfakes generated than every other year combined. Bad people – some for mercenary purposes, some just kids who do bad things – have learned about this, and the idea is spreading. And no one is immune from it – not kids in school, not members of Congress, not even, as we’ve learned recently, the most famous celebrities in the world.

The DEFIANCE Act will give these victims justice by allowing them to take civil action against those who generate and distribute deepfakes using AI and other technologies.

And as I’ve said before, this DEFIANCE Act is one example of the AI guardrails I often talk about. AI is a remarkable technology that can spur incredible innovation, maybe even cure cancer and things like that. But at the same time, we must be vigilant and pass guardrails to prevent its worst abuses from causing people grave harm. I’m very hopeful that the House will pass this bill quickly. It got broad support here in the Senate.

And I thank Senator Durbin for leading the effort relentlessly on the DEFIANCE Act, and I’ve been proud to support this bill every step of the way and encourage its passage. And Tuesday night, we finally got it done here in the Senate.

House: move quickly! Save people from the scourge of this horrible, horrible action.

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