LOS ANGELES — They called it “Holo-Donna.”
It was a holographic version of Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan, and she — it? — welcomed travelers making their way through Jacksonville International Airport. Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen demoed the technology. And in February, Sens. Cory Booker of New Jersey and Ashley Moody of Florida used it to appear on stage at the National Association of Realtors’ political confab in Las Vegas.
Years after Andrew Yang, the tech-minded 2020 presidential candidate, tested the idea of campaigning by hologram alongside a digital representation of the late Tupac Shakur, the medium is starting to make inroads in American politics. It’s long overdue, said one Hollywood figure who knows a thing or two about being beamed elsewhere.
“Imagine the head of government being in the vicinity of your group, addressing your group, looking at your group, singling out people in the group,” William Shatner told POLITICO.
The “Star Trek” icon, who began using holograms in 2023 to remotely participate in conferences and other events, described the technology in terms that veered toward the metaphysical: “You're in the midst of the currents of conversation. You're there, but you're not there. It’s the secret of the future.”
And while Shatner likened holograms to “a form of teleporting” into the public sphere, at least some political strategists are taking the tactic seriously.
“If you want to have a more integrated experience with a group of 200 people from a union or a trade association … then you're providing a better, more enhanced, more personal type of interface,” said Rob Stutzman, who was deputy chief of staff for communications to former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Holograms, Stutzman said, “could significantly enhance retail and coalition politics.”
The technology that Stutzman and the erstwhile Captain Kirk were discussing — the system used by Deegan, Booker and Moody — displays a digital, life-size version of a person inside a seven-foot, glass-fronted rectangular box. It is made by a Los Angeles company called Proto Hologram, a pioneer in the deployment of holograms in several arenas, including politics. Chair David Nussbaum said that the field is “the ultimate use case,” pointing to opportunities for speeches, debates and campaigning.
“The next president of the United States ought to be campaigning in all 50 states simultaneously without leaving the safety and security of their own campaign headquarters,” said Nussbaum.
There is some international precedent. Several leaders have used Proto or similar technology that Nussbaum helped develop, including former Luxembourg Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, former German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and India’s Narendra Modi, who deployed a hologram to campaignwhile first running for prime minister in 2014.
Today it’s mayors who appear to be the most eager political adopters of the technology, especially in Northern California. San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie and San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan both recently debuted airport holograms. A few years earlier, Jeffrey Mims Jr., then mayor of Dayton, Ohio, unveiled one at his local airport. The upside for politicians is that it could allow them to beam themselves to multiple audiences at once — to be present, in some form, where they are not.
The risk, of course, is that in an era when authenticity is king, appearing in a telephone booth-like cabinet is, well, not.
“I’m sure … this will pass for what they think is interacting with people — safely ensconced in an undisclosed location, surrounded by yes-men, spouting wisdom through a holographic figure,” said Jeff Weaver, who managed Sen. Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential run. “It is a height of inauthenticity, but I’m sure that many in Congress who are completely out of touch will view this as a new way to spread wisdom without actually having to shake hands and press the flesh with real people.”
“Holo-Donna” illustrates the perils of this digital embrace.
Deegan, a Democratic mayor in a staunchly Republican state, introduced her Proto hologram in December 2024. “Whether you’re here for business, a vacation, or visiting family and friends, we’re excited to have you,” said the mayor in the prerecorded message the machine played.
After learning it reportedly cost the city about $75,000, some in Jacksonville — including members of the City Council — railed against the virtual stand-in for the mayor. One councilmember called it a “godawful boondoggle.” The Proto device was removed from the airport in February per a preexisting plan. By then, however, it’d become a national news story: “Ego-crazed Democrat mayor is blasted for erecting 'hologram' of HERSELF at airport,” the Daily Mail blared.
Deegan, who previously defended her decision to use the Proto cabinet, declined to comment through a spokesperson, who added, “She is not interested in any article around the Proto Hologram.”
Lurie also declined to comment through a spokesperson. Representatives of Booker and Moody did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesperson for Pillen said only that his use of a hologram had merely been part of a “demo.”
There was, however, one politician willing to discuss his hologram: Mahan, a California gubernatorial candidate. His hologram was made by Palo Alto-based LiveX AI and displayed at San Jose Mineta International Airport in the run-up to the Super Bowl in February.
“It was a lot of fun, and we heard a lot of buzz,” said Mahan. “Most people had not interacted with a hologram before, much less with one of their mayor. … The hologram that represents the likeness of a candidate is a higher bandwidth way of getting a feel for who they are, assuming it’s a fairly accurate representation of their personality and their beliefs.”
Mahan touted his “digital twin” in a February social media post that claimed he was the “the first Mayor in the world to be made into a hologram.” That is not accurate: Mims and Deegan debuted their holograms more than a year earlier, and Lurie beat him by at least a day.
There’s something inherently fun — and a little bit surreal — about holograms, which conjure sci-fi visions: More than one person interviewed for this story mentioned R2-D2’s projection of a Princess Leia hologram in “Star Wars.” But the thing about Proto’s holograms: they aren’t actually holograms, at least not technically. A true hologram is created using an interference pattern of laser light, which can make it seem as though an object or person is there in three-dimensional space.
What Proto produces, Nussbaum said at his company’s office in a semi-industrial section of the San Fernando Valley, “is not really a true hologram.” Instead, Proto uses a high-definition touch-screen display, special lighting and software to create an image with shadows, lending it a lifelike quality.
“It’s more of a spatial projection,” said Nussbaum, who holds several patents related to the technology. “It is a hologram-ish effect.”
Nussbaum, who had a prior career in the podcasting industry, became interested in holograms in 2013, when he was introduced to a businessperson who owned the patents that underpinned the system that brought a holographic version of Shakur to the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festivalstage in 2012 — a watershed moment in the history of the medium. Nussbaum acquired those patents and worked with others to “resurrect” other dead celebrities for similar performances, he said.
All the while, Nussbaum sought a more portable version of hologram technology, tinkering with it from his dining room in North Hills. By 2019, he had one working cabinet — and began taking it to entertainment industry events. Before long, Nussbaum had secured new patents, comedian Howie Mandel was investing in Proto and celebrities including Elton John, Jimmy Kimmel, Melissa McCarthy and the Kardashians were using the company’s devices.
Proto’s offices are housed in a warehouse owned by Mandel, who records his namesake podcast there. In the sprawling facility’s central room, the company’s cabinets were lined up in a row like expensive dominos — they go for about $25,000, and the software costs $5,000 annually — and each one was filled with a holographic notable. Like influencer-cum-professional wrestler Logan Paul. “We used to collaborate on videos,” Nussbaum said of the blonde provocateur.
The company’s system — it also sells a smaller unit for about $7,000 — has many capabilities, including a live, two-way mode. That’s how Booker and Moody used it, participating in what were essentially very lifelike Zoom calls.
Proto’s platform can also be used to deliver prerecorded messages, as with the hologram of Deegan. Then there is a version in which the holographic figure can, using a customized AI model, respond to questions or other prompts from someone standing in front of the device. One of these depicting Theodore Roosevelt is on display at Theodore Roosevelt Inaugural National Historic Site in upstate New York.
The most advanced option: a generative AI-powered hologram that can realistically convey a personality, allowing it to converse with people on nearly any subject (there are guardrails to block certain topics deemed inappropriate, Nussbaum said). One of these featuring Shatner was on display at Proto offices, and the effect was uncanny. The digitized image of the actor responded to a variety of questions in English — and then instantly switched to Japanese when prompted. Shatner — the real one — joked that his Japanese has “a Canadian accent,” a reference to his place of birth.
Nussbaum sees applications for this language tool for candidates running for office.
“Let’s say you only speak English, but you’ve got lots of constituents that are voters who maybe only understand Mandarin or Hindi or Japanese or Spanish or French,” he said. “You can communicate with them in the language of their choice, and it doesn't change what you're saying.”
The midterm elections would seem to present an opportunity for Proto, but Nussbaum was coy, smiling wryly and saying only, “We’re talking to some folks.”
Since so many of the politicians using holograms declined interview requests — or never bothered to reply — it’s hard to know whether any might factor the technology into their future campaigns. But maybe one of their holograms would talk?
The Lurie hologram at San Francisco International Airport was better than the real thing in one respect: It didn’t decline to comment. Instead, it showed footage of the mayor, dressed in a dark suit and tie, delivering a prerecorded message about San Francisco being a “collection of cultures and stories.”
Holograms went unmentioned.
Debra Kahn contributed to this report.
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