The 2026 midterms are the first US election in which AI is built into every major social media platform, from embedded chatbots and media generation tools to content moderation. 

Ahead of November, ISD assessed how platforms including Meta-owned Facebook and Instagram, X, YouTube, Snapchat and TikTok are preparing to protect free and open political discourse, election integrity and public safety through their policies, public commitments and product features. The assessment also examines how platform voter perception and behavior, while transparency and independent scrutiny have not kept pace. 

This report’s central finding is that transparency has not kept pace with AI integration. Many AI features and integrations are new, with some launching only months before the election, yet platforms have disclosed little about how they work, how they are tested or the extent to which they have replaced human oversight. Platforms provide researchers with little to no access to these systems, and any access granted is voluntary. In the EU, by contrast, the Digital Services Act gives vetted researchers a legal right to data. Without a US framework requiring platforms to disclose information or conduct risk assessments, there is little incentive for platforms to open these systems to public scrutiny.

At the same time, platforms are reducing their reliance on professional human oversight. Third- party fact-checking, as well as trust and safety teams, have been scaled back in favor of crowd- sourced and automated systems. These approaches can offer important benefits, including operating at greater scale, but relying on them as the primary means of oversight during a fast-moving election cycle remains an untested proposition.

Taken together, these trends point to a gap in platform preparedness. AI is becoming a central element of the information environment shaping voter perception and behavior, while transparency and independent scrutiny have not kept pace. As a result, voters, election officials and researchers have limited visibility into how platforms will respond when election-related risks emerge.