Tajani wearing a Maga cap; Forza Italia against Bonaccini: ‘Fake photo’. The PD leader deletes the post
The government also weighed in, with the Under-Secretary for Publishing, Alberto Barachini, speaking out. In his view, the use of artificial intelligence to denigrate representatives of the institutions is ‘serious’, all the more so at a time marked by cyber-attacks and hybrid threats
A post reading ‘We’ve never been Trump supporters’ and, below it, a photo of Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani wearing a ‘Make America Great Again’ cap. It was posted by Stefano Bonaccini, and Forza Italia responded within a few hours, before the PD leader had a change of heart and removed the tongue-in-cheek post.
Response from Forza Italia
According to spokesperson Raffaele Nevi, this marks the ‘lowest point’ ever reached by political debate in the history of the Republic. The party has called on Bonaccini to apologise and remove the content, and has appealed to all political parties for solidarity with a minister who, as Nevi points out, has been living under a protection programme since receiving threats, which ‘severely restricts’ his freedom.
Maurizio Gasparri, chair of the Senate’s Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee, says that the image is ‘the result of artificial intelligence’. According to Senator Tajani, he never wore that cap – which was being handed out as a promotional item – and left it with the person who had given it to him. Gasparri then addressed the PD’s secretary, Elly Schlein: he asked her to reprimand the party leader for his behaviour and to commit to not using AI-generated fakes.
No AI in the election campaign
The government also weighed in, with the Under-Secretary for Publishing, Alberto Barachini, speaking out. In his view, the use of artificial intelligence to denigrate representatives of public institutions is ‘serious’, all the more so at a time marked by cyber-attacks and hybrid threats. Barachini recalled that he had already asked political parties not to use digitally altered voices and faces during the election campaign, and called on AGCOM to consider including regulations on this matter in the guidelines for the forthcoming election.
The previous one
The cap had already been at the centre of a row in March. At a hearing before the Foreign Affairs and Defence Committees, Giuseppe Conte had criticised Tajani for the MAGA cap he was holding at the first meeting of the Board of Peace in Washington. The minister had replied that it was a gift.
