A 22-year-old medical student from northern India has revealed how he created an AI-generated conservative influencer to exploit what he called the “dumb” MAGA crowd, earning thousands of dollars a month. Speaking to Wired, the student, identified only as Sam, said he launched Instagram and Facebook pages featuring 'Emily Hart', an AI-generated woman, to generate extra cash while studying.
Sam told Wired that the MAGA audience was easy to fool. “The MAGA crowd is made up of dumb people—like, super dumb people. And they fall for it,” he said. The posts on Emily Hart's accounts touched on topics such as immigration and abortion, with one reading: “If you want a reason to unfollow: Christ is king, abortion is murder, and all illegals must be deported.”
The Instagram page was banned in February for “fraudulent” activity, and the Facebook page has also been taken down. Meta, the parent company of both platforms, has a policy requiring disclosure for AI-generated content, stating it labels such content to promote transparency. Sam said he used Google's Gemini AI platform to create the influencer, which initially suggested a generic 'hot girl' but then recommended the “MAGA/conservative niche” to attract a loyal, older male US audience.
A Google spokesperson told The Independent that Gemini is designed to respond without conveying a particular set of beliefs, and in this case, it provided options based on Sam's request. In addition to social media, Sam sold MAGA merchandise and subscriptions to a Fanvue page, a competitor of OnlyFans. Sam expressed no regret, stating, “I was spending maybe 30 to 50 minutes of my day, and I was making good money for a medical student.”
