Time
by Andrew R. Chow and Chantelle Lee
June 12, 2025
As thousands of demonstrators have taken to the streets of Los Angeles County to protest Immigration and Customs Enforcement raids, misinformation has been running rampant online.
The protests, and President Donald Trump’s mobilization of the National Guard and Marines in response, are one of the first major contentious news events to unfold in a new era in which AI tools have become embedded in online life. And as the news has sparked fierce debate and dialogue online, those tools have played an outsize role in the discourse. Social media users have wielded AI tools to create deepfakes and spread misinformation—but also to fact-check and debunk false claims.