Paul Carpenter told NBC News that he was paid $150 to produce a fake AI-generated voice message from Joe Biden — and that the political operative Steve Kramer hired him to do it. Kramer has worked with Democratic presidential candidate Dean Phillips’ campaign to gather signatures to get on the ballot. NBC didn’t find evidence that the Phillips campaign was involved in the robocalls.
The parties reportedly involved apparently were not very discreet. Kramer texted the magician, “Have AI voice project” in September. And then there’s this:
On Jan. 22, when NBC News first broke the news of the fake Biden robocall, Steve Kramer texted Carpenter a link to the story along with the message, “Shhhhhhh,” to which Carpenter replied, “Gtfooh,” an acronym used to express astonishment.