Russian news commentary show PolitUkladchik pioneered the first national television network use of deepfake "interviews" with world leaders and last week was back with its first deepfake "debate" between two heads of state: Presidents Trump and Macron. The quality of the deepfake imagery appears noticeably lower than in previous weeks, though it did a good job of capturing the two leaders' respective typical body language. In an interesting twist, the show restored its onscreen AI disclaimer text that it had dropped in last week's deepfakes.
You can see the clip, along with a machine-generated translated transcript below:
On-screen text: ВНИМАНИЕ! ЭКСКЛЮЗИВ! (ATTENTION! EXCLUSIVE!)
Anchor: (00:00) …Trump. In other words, to spite mom, I'll freeze my ears.
Anchor: (00:04) We've got our hands on an exclusive from artificial intelligence. A quarrel of the frostbitten.
On-screen text: ДАННОЕ ИНТЕРВЬЮ СОСТОЯЛОСЬ БЛАГОДАРЯ ИИ (THIS INTERVIEW TOOK PLACE THANKS TO AI)
Donald Trump: (00:09) I always knew it. I told everyone, they did this just to spite me. Weak little people.
Donald Trump: (00:15) When you can't win honestly, you resort to such petty tricks. They recognized Palestine just to ruin my day.
Emmanuel Macron: (00:23) Donald, mon ami, you're finally starting to understand the subtle mechanics of European diplomacy.
Emmanuel Macron: (00:31) …your endless stream of advice on how we should live, your threats regarding NATO, and your habit of calling me a "boy." It gets on my nerves.
Emmanuel Macron: (00:43) We needed to let off some steam.
Donald Trump: (00:45) Let off steam? You let off steam? This is world politics, not French cuisine where you let steam out of a pastry! Are you an idiot?
Donald Trump: (00:56) You've buried all of Middle Eastern policy. Yes, I'll hit you with tariffs! On your champagne, on your cheeses, on your damn mold!
Donald Trump: (01:05) You'll find out what it means to anger Donald Trump.
Emmanuel Macron: (01:08) Oh. Donald, honestly, this is predictable. Angry shouts… that's boring. But watching you get angry, that's fun.
Emmanuel Macron: (01:19) We in Europe sit down in the evenings, drink wine, and laugh at you.
Donald Trump: (01:25) I knew it! A conspiracy! Little, envious people. I made Israel great. And you, what have you done? You recognized Palestine, which has nothing left in it. Congratulations on a great victory!
Emmanuel Macron: (01:39) Thank you. Sometimes victory is measured by the expression on the face of the man in the White House when they bring him the newspaper in the morning.
Emmanuel Macron: (01:48) And you know, it was worth it. You have to agree, it was elegant.
Emmanuel Macron: (01:53) I'm going to have a drink with Scholz and Ursula. We'll think about what other political decision we can make to ruin your weekend.
Donald Trump: (02:01) You wanted to get to me, and you got to me. But this will cost you dearly. I'm going to call Netanyahu right now, and we'll recognize your Corsica as independent. That's my answer for you!
Anchor: (02:14) We'll show you how this scandal ended next time, but for now, on to the other scandals of the week.
