Did WaPo run a cartoon ad drawn by AI?

On Facebook, Matt Wuerker declared it did, saying, " Ai slop on the back page of this morning’s Post. They could have hired one of scores of cartoonists and illustrators to create something far superior not to mention real, drawn by human hands. Instead they went with insipid dreck?"

and later, " Yes, correct. this is a paid ad, not an editorial cartoon. It's the kind of gig that used to pay a freelance cartoonist a decent amount of money. Now that money, or tokens go to an Ai slop company. It's much bigger than the fate of just editorial cartoonists. It's about human artists of all kinds vs big tech."

The ad is by a presumably leftwing organization btw, American United for the Separation of Church and State. It ran on September 17, 2026, p. A18. A tearsheet is going to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library for future research.