Adam Schiff stood before Congress in 2019 and read fabricated Trump quotes to the American people.
Now he wants to make sure no one else can do what he did.
The bill Schiff just introduced would outlaw exactly the move that built his career.
Schiff Introduces the AI Ads Act After Building a Career on Political Parody
California Sen. Adam Schiff introduced two bills last week targeting political speech ahead of the 2026 midterms.
The first, called the AI Ads Act, would ban AI-generated content that fraudulently impersonates political candidates or campaigns.
The second, the Promoting Authenticity with Influencer Disclaimers Act, would require political committees to publicly disclose payments made to social media influencers for campaign content.
Schiff says both bills are about protecting democracy.
What he left out is that he personally demonstrated the exact behavior his AI Ads Act is designed to stop – and got caught doing it on national television seven years ago.
In September 2019, Schiff chaired a House Intelligence Committee hearing on the whistleblower complaint against President Trump.
He opened the session by reading what he claimed was the substance of Trump's July phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Every word was fabricated.
"I want you to make up dirt on my political opponent," Schiff said from the committee dais, appearing to read from a document – putting those words directly into Trump's mouth.
Not a single line Schiff delivered matched the actual transcript the White House had released the day before.
When Rep. Mike Turner of Ohio called him out mid-hearing, Schiff reached for a defense that has since become legendary for its shamelessness: the whole thing was "parody."
The Ukraine Transcript Schiff Fabricated and Called Parody
Schiff's fabricated reading came with no disclaimer, no wink to the audience, and no indication the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee was doing a bit.
He delivered fake presidential quotes from a piece of paper, before a live national audience, to launch a presidential impeachment push.
The parody defense appeared only after Turner forced the admission.
Now Schiff wants to write into federal law restrictions that would have applied directly to himself – rules that ban the very conduct he already committed before Congress.
The AI Ads Act was triggered specifically by Spencer Pratt's Los Angeles mayoral campaign, which used AI to mock incumbent Karen Bass as the Joker while Pratt played Batman fighting crime across the city.
The ads were funny, clearly satirical, and effective – and California Democrats furious about those ads decided they needed federal help making sure it never happens again.
The Cato Institute's David Inserra called the broader congressional push to police political speech online "a frightening attack on the First Amendment."
Political parody has been protected speech in America since before Adam Schiff took his first congressional oath.
From Russia Collusion to January 6 to a First Amendment Rollback
Adam Schiff has always had one set of rules for himself and a different one for everyone else.
He told Americans for years that evidence of Trump-Russia collusion was in "plain sight" – a claim that died quietly after Robert Mueller spent two years and $32 million finding nothing to support it.
Schiff chaired the January 6 committee Nancy Pelosi assembled with no meaningful minority participation, the same committee that withheld exculpatory evidence and altered a text message from Rep. Jim Jordan.
House Republicans removed him from the House Intelligence Committee he once chaired when they took the majority in 2023.
California Democrats sent him to the Senate the following year.
From that seat, Schiff now calls himself a guardian of election integrity.
The man who fabricated Trump's words before Congress wants the federal government to police what political satirists can say about politicians.
Voters can see exactly what this bill is.
Call it what it is: a speech suppression bill from a senator who has spent his entire career playing by two completely different sets of rules.
The man who used "parody" to escape accountability before Congress is now trying to write that escape hatch out of the law for everyone else.
Sources:
- Staff, "Schiff Clarifies His Fabricated Account Of Ukraine Transcript By Calling It 'Parody'," Daily Caller, September 26, 2019.
- Staff, "Schiff Slammed for Chalking Up 'Disturbing' Fictional Account of Trump-Ukraine Call to 'Parody'," Fox News, September 26, 2019.
- Matt Margolis, "Adam Schiff Fabricates Contents of Ukraine Call Transcript; Claims They Were 'Parody'," PJ Media, September 26, 2019.
- Joe Saunders, "Total Fraud: Adam Schiff Demands AI Political Parodies Be Banned, Forgets He Lied About Trump and Called It Parody in 2019," The Western Journal/Gateway Pundit, July 31, 2026.
- Staff, "See The Hilarious AI Ads That Furious California Democrats Want Banned," ZeroHedge, July 30, 2026.
- Mary Rooke, "First Amendment Orgs Skewer Bipartisan Lawmakers' 'Frightening' Attempt To Police Election Speech," Daily Caller, July 10, 2026.
