As the United States approaches the 2026 midterm elections, the intersection of technology, politics, and law is shaping the landscape in ways both familiar and alarmingly novel. From the digital front lines of misinformation to the courtroom battles over how votes are counted and who counts them, the coming electoral cycle is poised to test the resilience of American democracy like never before.
In the wake of the contentious 2024 presidential race, technologists and election experts are sounding the alarm about the expanding role of tech-fueled misinformation and disinformation campaigns. According to News From The States, the rapid evolution of generative artificial intelligence and the widespread use of social media platforms have brought the volume and sophistication of disinformation to unprecedented levels. "We have had much more volume of misinformation, disinformation grabbing the attention of the electorate," said Daniel Trielli, assistant professor of media and democracy at the University of Maryland. "And quickly following through that, we see a professionalization of disinformation … The active use of these social media platforms to spread disinformation."
This professionalization—where targeted campaigns are crafted to sow confusion and apathy—was a defining concern ahead of the 2024 election. Bad actors, both foreign and domestic, deployed AI-generated text messages, photos, and videos to undermine faith in the electoral process. The result? A citizenry more divided and, in many cases, more susceptible to falsehoods than ever before. Adam Darrah, vice president of intelligence at cybersecurity platform ZeroFox, noted, "They’re very good at finding niche societal fissures in any civilized government. They’re like, 'Okay, let’s have another meeting today about things we can do, to just like, keep Americans at each other’s throat.'"
Foreign interference has not been limited to the United States. As Ken Jon Miyachi, founder of deepfake detection tool BitMind, pointed out, AI-generated content played a major role in elections in India, Taiwan, and Indonesia. In Indonesia, for example, the political party Golkar used AI to reanimate the image of Suharto, the long-dead dictator, for political endorsements. Miyachi’s company, founded in early 2024, offers real-time assessment of AI-generated material, a tool he believes is crucial as the world heads into more election cycles fraught with digital deception. "You really need a more proactive, real-time strategy to be able to combat misinformation and be able to identify it," Miyachi said.
Yet, technology is only part of the story. The regulatory and legal frameworks governing elections are also in flux. In Florida, a high-profile legal battle over voting methods has drawn national attention. On October 15, 2025, a Florida appeals court rejected Republican efforts to change Alachua County’s election system from at-large voting—where all voters cast ballots for all commissioners—to district-based voting. According to WUFT News, former Republican state Sen. Keith Perry and others had sought to implement district-based elections, hoping to concentrate GOP influence in areas outside Gainesville. Their efforts, however, were rebuffed by the court, preserving a system under which Democrats have historically thrived.
Democrat Ken Cornell, vice chair of the Alachua County Commission, welcomed the ruling, arguing it protects residents from bureaucratic obstacles and ensures broader representation. Cornell explained, "From their perspective, they had no representation, because they couldn't go to another commissioner because they weren't represented by another commissioner. So they went from having five people that they could talk to to zero, because that person disagreed." He added that district-based elections tend to narrow commissioners’ focus, encouraging parochial horse-trading instead of countywide solutions. The ruling means the 2026 election for two commission seats will proceed under the at-large system, unless the Florida Supreme Court intervenes.
Meanwhile, the broader national picture is complicated by shifting federal priorities. The Trump administration has rolled back several key cybersecurity and election security initiatives, including downsizing the Cyber and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and cutting funding for the Elections Information Sharing and Analysis Center. According to Tim Harper, project lead for Elections and Democracy at the Center for Democracy and Technology, "There are a number of ways across the federal government where resourcing and capacity for cybersecurity and information sharing has been depleted this year. All that is to say we’re seeing that AI-based and boosted mis- and disinformation campaigns may take off in a much more serious way in coming years."
The consequences of these cutbacks are already being felt. In June 2025, Iranian hackers breached Arizona’s Secretary of State website, replacing candidate profile photos with images of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Arizona officials, shaken by the incident, expressed a loss of confidence in CISA’s ability to assist during cyberattacks, as reported by News From The States. Such breaches underscore the vulnerability of state election systems in the absence of robust federal support.
Complicating matters further, social media platforms have relaxed content moderation policies since 2024. Meta (the parent company of Facebook and Instagram) and X (formerly Twitter) have allowed political ads that perpetuate election denial and have reduced their flagging of misinformation. YouTube has also scaled back its efforts to counter false claims. This shift, according to Harper, has left the door wide open for falsehoods to spread unchecked. "It looks like we’re still kind of figuring out the new deal, the new contract between user and content moderators, technology, and free speech," said Darrah. "It seems to be we’re renegotiating the contract about what’s free, what’s hateful, what’s harmful. And it seems to be platform agnostic."
The debate over the boundaries of free speech and the obligation to counter foreign interference came to a head during a Senate Commerce Committee hearing on September 29, 2025. While some conservatives, including Chairman Ted Cruz, accused the Biden administration of pressuring social media companies to suppress protected speech, Harper argued that there is a clear distinction between safeguarding free expression and countering foreign meddling. "There is a distinction between the legitimate free speech that should be protected and must be protected, and the Cyber and Infrastructure Security Agency conducting operations to counter foreign interference," Harper said.
States have responded by enacting laws to regulate the use of AI in elections, banning or requiring disclaimers on AI-generated political messaging. But experts like Miyachi argue that only a global agreement can truly address the digital threats facing modern democracies. Looking ahead, experts warn that the 2026 midterms will likely see more sophisticated misinformation campaigns, powered by rapid advances in AI and emboldened by weakened federal oversight. "Bad actors have understood what works and what doesn’t work," Miyachi observed. "Yeah, it will be much more sophisticated going into the 2026 midterms and then the 2028 election."
As the nation braces for another election cycle, the stakes could hardly be higher. From the courtrooms of Florida to the servers of Silicon Valley, the fight to preserve trust in the democratic process is intensifying. Whether Americans will rise to the challenge—by demanding transparency, embracing new tools to spot deception, and insisting on fair representation—remains to be seen. But one thing is clear: the 2026 midterms will be a pivotal test of both the nation’s technological defenses and its democratic ideals.
