‘The future’ of Florida campaigns has arrived, and it’s created by AI

The year is 2028. Gov. Byron Donalds is presiding over a dystopian Florida overrun by energy-guzzling data centers. Utility bills have skyrocketed. “Marijuana monopolies” are poisoning the water. And, if things couldn’t get any worse, “AI hate speech is now a felony.”

There is only one man who can save the day: Lt. Gov. Jay Collins.

This is the Orwellian future depicted in one of several AI-generated attacks that have emerged from the online ecosystem supporting Collins, a former Republican state senator and Green Beret now running for governor.

The video is ridiculous by design. But it also exposes a striking contradiction at the heart of Collins’ candidacy.

Opposition to data centers has become one of the lieutenant governor’s signature campaign issues as he seeks to overtake Donalds, the Trump-endorsed frontrunner in the Republican primary and the beneficiary of support from a super PAC funded by AI industry giants.

Yet, even as Collins travels the state warning voters that artificial intelligence and the data centers that support it threaten Florida’s environment, energy grid and quality of life, some of the most salient messaging boosting his candidacy is being created with the help of the same technology.

The videos promoted by his campaign may also offer an early sign of where Florida politics is headed.

While so-called “AI slop” has surfaced in congressional races and presidential campaigns across the country, the videos appear to be among the first high-profile examples of a Florida gubernatorial candidate or his political allies using AI-generated content as a recurring campaign tactic.

Political observers say the technology is likely to become a fixture of future campaigns because it allows supporters to create professional-looking ads, songs and videos at little cost with virtually no gatekeepers.

“This is the future of political advertising,” said Jane Bambauer, a University of Florida law professor who studies technology and free speech. “Everyone’s going to be able to do this.”

As the technology becomes cheaper and more accessible, Bambauer said, political messaging will become increasingly decentralized. Candidates and parties may lose control over their own narratives as supporters, activists and influencers create and distribute content on their behalf. Some messages will go viral; others will disappear unnoticed.

“There will be fewer controls that the political parties, or even the candidates themselves, can exercise,” Bambauer said.

For now, though, Collins and his supporters seem comfortable leveraging fanmade AI content as political ammo against his their biggest rival.

A roughly minute-long video circulated on X by an account known as “Collins War Room” — which describes itself as the “Official War Room Account for DeSantis Appointed @JayCollinsFL” — and amplified by Collins supporters depicts Donalds as an authoritarian supervillain and Collins as a comic-book superhero.

Literally.

The video, which has garnered over 70,000 views as of Wednesday, opens with a scowling Donalds, sitting behind the governor’s desk one year into his hypothetical first term. Flanked by Jeffrey Epstein and Republican operative Roger Stone, Donalds brushes off as a working-class man in overalls pleading for relief from data centers and the utility bill hikes they bring.

“Guards, get this peasant out of my office,” the AI-generated Donalds snarls.

Bill Gates and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman cackle as Capitol police drag the man away.

Moments later, Collins bursts onto the scene donning a Captain America-style costume. He punches his way through a half-dozen officers before delivering a flying kick — aided by a bionic version of the prosthetic leg he wears after being wounded in Iraq — to Donalds’ face.

The Collins campaign did not respond for comment. A spokesperson for Donalds, a Naples-area congressman, declined to comment.

Donalds alluded to the video at an event in Miami last week as he laid out his AI policy agenda, saying, “There’s all kinda AI gifs and things running around. That’s fine, but whether it’s you or anyone else, you should be able to protect your name, image and likeness.”

The architect behind the video is Michael Thompson, a Winter Haven Republican who runs a THC chocolate and candy business as well as an AI-assisted marketing company called Green Peak Media.

Despite the videos’ appearance on accounts dedicated to promoting Collins, Thompson said he did not coordinate with the campaign. Instead, he said he shared the content with fellow Republicans in Polk County before they ended up on the Collins War Room account.

“I wasn’t coordinating with them,” Thompson said of the Collins campaign. “But, hey, if they want to offer me a job? Maybe.”

Thompson relied heavily on AI tools, software and “synthetic” assistants he developed himself. He described himself as the “executive producer” of the videos and said he was motivated by what he viewed as insufficient criticism of Donalds’ support for data center development.

“I was wanting to convey a story that I didn’t see the campaign conveying: basically, that Byron Donalds is in alignment with data centers,” Thompson said. He pointed to a Collins event in Polk County where the lieutenant governor discussed requiring data centers to generate their own power and use closed-loop water systems.

“I was like, ‘OK, this is the guy,’” Thompson said of Collins. “But he’s got to be marketed better.”

The Captain America video is just one entry in Thompson’s growing catalog of AI-generated content supporting Collins, which have been reposted on X by several of the lieutenant governor’s allies including his wife, Layla Collins; John Cardillo, a senior adviser to the Collins campaign; and Jason Puwalski, Collins’ press secretary.

Thompson said there’s more videos to come. His catalog so far includes “Data Center Donalds,” a catchy Lego-style music video attacking the congressman. Collins called the earworm “pretty cool” on X.

A sequel song, “Old McByron,” goes like this: “Old McByron had a plan. AI, AI, o. And on that plan he built a grid. AI, AI, o. With a data center here, and a data center there….”

Thompson acknowledged that the Lego aesthetic was inspired in part by AI-generated videos that circulated online from Iranian state-linked accounts attacking President Donald Trump.

“I saw what Iran was doing,” Thompson said. “You have the ground war, and then you have the propaganda war, and I saw what Iran was doing with the propaganda war, and I realized how powerful that was.”

Thompson embraces AI enthusiastically — even as the candidate benefiting from his work campaigns against the spread of AI infrastructure.

Thompson said he does not oppose data centers categorically, but believes they should be located outside Florida. He argued the United States has become fixated on building massive data centers to gain an edge in AI, while countries such as China are pursuing more efficient computing technologies that may require less energy and water.

Thompson still poked fun at the apparent contradiction in his latest production on Saturday, in a parody of an oft-memed clip from the Adolf Hitler-centered film “Downfall.”

In Thompson’s video, a Nazi Party official informs Donalds — standing in for Hitler — that “the Jay Collins supporters are using AI to call you out for your plans to make Florida the data center capital of the U.S.”

“I’m basically fully taking advantage of AI, 100%,” Thompson said. “And I’m not against AI data centers, I just don’t want them in Florida. Go put them in another state.”

Donalds has argued such facilities can be developed responsibly if they generate their own power, manage water consumption and shield ratepayers from added costs.

Collins has made opposition to data centers a central plank of his campaign, but as a state senator he voted for legislation that included tax incentives for them.

One of Collins’ opponents in the Republican primary, former House Speaker Paul Renner, dismissed the videos in an interview as “over the top.” (A miniature, AI-generated version of Renner can be seen in a bird cage on Donalds’ desk in Thompson’s Captain America video.)

Renner argued that voters deserve substantive engagement from candidates through televised debates and public appearances rather than AI-generated caricatures and social-media spectacles.

“It’s also disrespectful to the voters to run a caricature campaign,” Renner said. “He needs to show up and actually stand on the stage with all the other candidates.”

He also mocked Collins’ superhero alter ego.

“He’s making such a big deal about it and running these stupid AI videos that he’s Mr. Captain America, but can’t even show up for a single candidate forum with other candidates present,” Renner said.

This story was originally published June 10, 2026 at 11:47 AM.