A Canadian legislator has become the latest example of awkward AI usage after reading an AI chatbot’s formatting instructions during an official floor speech.
Ars Technica reports that Bill Oliver, a Progressive Conservative Party member of the legislative assembly of New Brunswick, Canada, inadvertently revealed his use of AI assistance when he read an apparent large language model prompt instruction into the official record during a speech last month. The embarrassing moment has since gone viral on social media and attracted significant media attention across Canada.
During his remarks, Oliver discussed the potential pitfalls of establishing advocacy offices, stating that “One of the dangers associated with creating advocacy offices is that citizens often develop expectations that exceed the powers actually granted to those offices.” However, he then proceeded to read an AI-generated instruction, saying “here’s a more natural, flowing version of that section that reads like a legislative speech rather than a series of short points.” This phrase is typical of an AI chatbot offering an alternative writing style in response to a user prompt.
The unusual statement initially went largely unnoticed during the actual speech. However, video footage of Oliver’s remarks began circulating on social media platforms including Reddit and Threads earlier this week, quickly gaining traction among users. The incident has now received coverage from major Canadian news outlets such as the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and the Toronto Star.
The Star characterized the gaffe as evidence of “a growing divide in our society: between the elites, who are only too happy to delegate their duties to the Borg; and the masses, who find this objectionable.”
While Oliver is certainly not the first politician to deliver a speech written by someone else, and likely not the first to employ AI assistance in speechwriting, his public reading of an obvious AI-generated instruction without apparent real-time awareness represents what observers are calling a new level of embarrassing AI disclosure.
Breitbart News has reported extensively on law firms who run into trouble by filing legal documents with judges filled with AI halluciations, including elite Wall Street firm Sullivan & Cromwell:
A senior partner at Sullivan & Cromwell, sent a letter last week to Chief Judge Martin Glenn in Manhattan acknowledging that a previous filing submitted by the firm contained inaccurate citations and what he described as AI hallucinations. The filing was made on behalf of Prince Global Holdings, the bankrupt firm that Sullivan & Cromwell represented in the case.
In his letter, Andrew Dietderich, co-head of Global Finance & Restructuring for Sullivan & Cromwell, explained the nature of the problem. “‘Hallucinations’ are instances in which artificial intelligence tools fabricate case citations, misquote authorities, or generate non-existent legal sources,” he wrote. “We deeply regret that this has occurred.”
As politicians and law firms struggle with AI, America as a whole is waking up to the fact that AI presents both great opportunity and great danger to our country and culture. Breitbart News social media director Wynton Hall has written his instant bestseller Code Red: The Left, the Right, China, and the Race to Control AI to serve as the definitive guide on how the MAGA movement can create positions on AI that benefit humanity without handing control of our nation to the leftists of Silicon Valley or allowing the Chinese to take over the world.
Read more at Ars Technica here.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of AI, free speech, and online censorship.