Judge rebukes HHS for AI-generated fake studies in teen pregnancy policy
A federal judge rebuked the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for citing nonexistent or misrepresented studies—potentially AI-generated—in a legal filing defending restrictions on teen pregnancy prevention funding. The judge issued a preliminary injunction pausing the policy, which had already resulted in millions of dollars in grant cuts.
What happened
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, headed by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., submitted a legal filing defending sweeping changes to federal teen pregnancy prevention programs that would limit funding to abstinence-based and 'body literacy' programming.
U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper found that grant solicitations referenced public health studies that appeared either not to exist or did not support the propositions for which they were cited. Of seven cited articles, two appeared to be entirely made up and three others did not exist in the journals they were attributed to.
Reported impact
The HHS policy changes had already led to millions of dollars in grant cuts to teen pregnancy prevention programs. Judge Cooper issued a preliminary injunction to pause the order while the underlying lawsuit continues.
Index analysis
Cooper characterized the citation pattern as a hallmark of AI-generated citations. The Judge called the policy changes 'likely arbitrary and capricious' and found the government had failed to provide adequate evidence for its sweeping mandate that only abstinence strategies be pursued across all age groups and communities.
Governance controls
This was not the first instance of AI-generated falsehoods associated with HHS leadership. The Washington Post previously reported that citations in the White House's 'Make America Healthy Again' report had also been AI-generated, producing garbled references and invented studies.
Classification
Sources and evidence
This record was researched and written by the Index, based on the following original reporting.