JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Duval County School Board candidate Clarence James is speaking out regarding his campaign using artificial intelligence-generated images.
The latest mailer for the District 6 candidate features an AI-generated depiction of a school police officer. While the figure in the uniform strongly resembles James, it is not actually him.
“You could clearly tell it’s not really him in the picture, which is a mess,” said Duval voter Christopher James after viewing the flyer.
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Clarence James said that the use of a generic AI figure was a choice meant to avoid ethical conflicts rather than deceive the public.
“The AI was generated of a generic police uniform, has SPS on it for School Police, Sergeant rank, and the individual resembles me,” James said. “But I didn’t want my face on that image because I didn’t want it to be misperceived that I’m endorsed by the Duval County School Police Department.”
James confirmed that his campaign released two separate flyers: one featuring a real photograph of him in a suit, and the controversial AI-generated version. He emphasized that his goal was to highlight his professional background and platform.
“I wasn’t trying to use any type of trickery to make people think that that is actually me,” James stated. “I wanted the message to be that there’s an active school police sergeant that’s willing to take the pay cut, that’s willing to go out there and fight to make our institution safer.”
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The controversy comes just weeks after James’ campaign faced criticism for another AI-generated image that appeared to show a large group of black supporters attending a church fish fry. But in reality, he was standing with two friends.
James says that the image was posted without his approval and was removed weeks after it surfaced as soon as he learned about it.
“I don’t need to AI any people of color in any photo. I have support of the black community; I have support of their community in its entirety,” said James.
James says moving forward, they won’t be using AI images anymore.
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