Deepfake Mark Zuckerberg thanks Democrats for their ‘service and inaction’ on antitrust bills

A deepfake version of Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg thanked Congressional Democrats for their ‘service and inaction’ on antitrust legislation.

The eerie, convincing clip is the work of a liberal advocacy group called Demand Progress Action, which used deepfake technology to turn an actor into Zuckerberg – who thanks Democratic leaders Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer for holding up two major pieces of antitrust legislation this year.

‘Over the past five years, Congress has held over 30 hearings designed to hold Big Tech accountable,’ fake Zuckerberg says in the ad, which the liberal group plans to use for television ads in New York and Washington, D.C. ‘Sometimes you land a punch.’ 

A clip of Democratic Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez grilling the tech executive about fact checking political advertisements briefly plays.

‘Most of the time, it felt like playing paddy cake,’ fake Zuckerberg boasts. 

The eerie, convincing clip is the work of a liberal advocacy group called Demand Progress Action, which used deepfake technology to turn an actor into Zuckerberg

‘So I’d like to propose a toast to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (above),’ fake Zuckerberg says, holding a glass of champagne

We then see a clip of Republican Sen. Hatch asking him how he sustains a business model where users don’t pay for services. A grinning Zuckerberg says: ‘Senator, we run ads.’ 

‘Either way, it looks like the most consequential action that Congress is poised to take, a bipartisan bill to prevent companies like mine from self-dealing, is about to fade away like so many efforts to rein in big tech in the past.’

The advocacy group takes aim at the lack of action on two bills, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act and the Open App Markets Act. 

The former would limit how tech firms can give preference to their own products and services in marketplaces, while the second adds regulations to prevent them from self-dealing when the promote their own applications in app stores. 

Both bills are out of committee, but neither has been scheduled for a vote. 

‘When the House changes hands in January, who seriously thinks the Republicans will do any better than Democrats?’ fake Zuck asks, calling Big Tech ‘the golden goose that keeps giving and giving.’ 

‘You know, we let them pretend to hate us out on the stump. But in Congress they’re some of our strongest defenders,’ he says. 

The video cuts to a clip of Republican Rep. Jim Jordan, who has been a critic of Big Tech, urging a no vote on a bill targeting the industry.

According to Bloomberg, Schumer has received close to $30,000 from tech firms and tech lobbyists dating back to 2017.  

‘So I’d like to propose a toast to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer,’ fake Zuckerberg says, holding a glass of champagne. 

‘Once again, you held up your side of the bargain by holding up new laws that would hold us accountable. Thank you for your service to me and all of my friends,’ he concludes, before photos of Jeff Bezos, Sundar Pichai and Tim Cook appear onscreen next to his. 

The narrator intones at the end: ‘The Zuck is face but the message is real. Call on Senator Schumer to get big tech antitrust done during this Congress.’ 

‘If Sen. Schumer does not call a vote on these bills or attach them to a must-pass vehicle in the weeks ahead, he will have squandered Congress’s best chance to hold Big Tech accountable in a generation,’ Demand Progress said in a statement. 

The advocacy group takes aim at the lack of action on two bills, the American Innovation and Choice Online Act and the Open App Markets Act

‘If Sen. Schumer does not call a vote on these bills or attach them to a must-pass vehicle in the weeks ahead, he will have squandered Congress’s best chance to hold Big Tech accountable in a generation,’ Demand Progress said in a statement