The Babylon Bee has gone to federal court to overturn a New Mexico law that would make political satire built with artificial intelligence carry a government-scripted line announcing the joke was machine-made, arguing in a complaint filed August 11 that the requirement is compelled speech reaching material the First Amendment protects.
We obtained a copy of the complaint for you here.
The law arrived as an amendment to the Campaign Reporting Act, an attempt by the state to force political advertisements containing materially "deceptive media" to include a disclaimer that material manipulated or generated by artificial intelligence is present.
According to the law, individual violations can land a fine of up to $1000, with fines as high as $20,000 for further violations. The law also makes it a criminal offense to distribute "materially deceptive" content or even agree to distribute it.
The Babylon Bee is represented by And Justice Law and Alliance Defending Freedom, which have helped in many free speech issues. The complaint calls for the courts to put an end to the state's ethics commission enforcing the law.
The complaint says the statute sweeps in constitutionally protected satire, parody, political cartoons, and memes, and it says the forced label rewrites the work itself.
According to the lawsuit, "This disclaimer alters the content of the satire and parody The Bee wants to express by alerting the viewer to the satirical or parodical nature of the communication and thereby depriving the expression of its rhetorical force."
The complaint added that "HB 182 spoils the joke as it begins, each and every time."
Seth Dillon, the Bee's chief executive, described the law as the state putting words in his company's mouth. "New Mexico is stuffing words into our mouths, forcing us to say things we wouldn't say otherwise," he told Fox News, calling the disclosure requirement a "deeper problem" of compelled speech. The company says it will not publish anything carrying the label, because the label changes what it is trying to say.
The complaint also raises the issue that the law isn't even enforced universally, with some types of media and professions getting a free pass. Radio and TV broadcasters do not have to add the warning label while showing the "manipulated" material, meaning that the law discriminates based on the creator of the content.
Jim Campbell, ADF's chief legal counsel, told Fox News Digital that the government "cannot decide which political speech is allowed and which is forbidden."
The Bee has faced no penalty and has not sued before any enforcement. The court has not ruled.
The law's sponsor, Gail Chasey, a Democrat, said it was aimed at artificial intelligence used to create misleading campaign images. Dillon told Fox News Digital that the Bee does not deny the problem exists. "The concern is real, but we don't censor ourselves," he said.
A spokesperson for the ethics commission said the "pre-enforcement lawsuit is baseless," and said the commission "has never taken action to enforce the AI-disclaimer requirements in Section 1-19-26.4 of the Campaign Reporting Act, much less for political parody and satire."
But New Mexico's own officials have already flagged the trouble. In 2025, Attorney General Raúl Torrez came to the conclusion that the forced disclaimers on satirical content were "likely unconstitutional."
The Babylon Bee fought a similar fight in Hawaii's own version of this compelled speech law, and won with ease.
