Stanley Druckenmiller's WSJ Op-Ed Criticizing Bessent Was Written with AI

Billionaire Stanley Druckenmiller, founder of Duquesne Capital, acknowledged Tuesday that his Wall Street Journal op-ed criticizing Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent's bond market intervention was written using artificial intelligence. An AI detection tool called Pangram found the text was 100 percent AI-generated, according to economist Claudia Sahm's social media post, though Druckenmiller said he rejected many AI suggestions and defended the practice, saying he uses AI for writing just as he uses a calculator for math. The Wall Street Journal did not immediately comment, and the disclosure follows a similar incident involving Harvard professor Ricardo Hausmann's Financial Times column, which the FT said violated its editorial code of conduct.

A billionaire acknowledged on Tuesday that his widely read opinion column in The Wall Street Journal criticizing Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s bond market intervention was written using artificial intelligence. Stanley Druckenmiller, a former hedge fund manager who founded Duquesne Capital, published “ Let the Bond Market Speak https://www.wsj.com/opinion/let-the-bond-market-speak-81529d74 ” on Monday, questioning Bessent’s interventions to hold down yields on U.S. treasuries. The article drew added attention because Druckenmiller worked with Bessent under George Soros, and is as a “mentor” to the treasury secretary. https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/stock-market-today-dow-sp-500-nasdaq-08-25-2026/card/bessent-mentor-druckenmiller-blasts-bond-intervention-mistake--nhXM2e6TUGOddEWSynLd sometimes described Pangram, an AI detection tool, found that Druckenmiller’s op-ed had been written using artificial intelligence, according to multiple social media posts. In an interview with NOTUS, Druckenmiller said “of course I used AI” when writing the column, and argued he didn’t see a problem with doing so. “There’s a reason I moved from an English major to being an economics major,” Druckenmiller said. “I’m not embarrassed by it … I write everything using AI now for the same reason I use a calculator when I do math problems.” Trending A spokesperson for The Wall Street Journal did not immediately return a request for comment. The use of AI by economists and other experts in writing opinion pieces has gained renewed scrutiny as the tool has become more widely used. Earlier this month, Harvard professor Ricardo Hausmann published https://www.ft.com/content/7ff4321e-3f96-4f7b-8f2d-4fefa4773a5d?sharetype=blocked a column in the Financial Times about Trump’s tariff regime. The column appeared laced with AI-inflected language, and the Financial Times later appended a note saying: “It has come to our attention that AI was used to condense a longer draft of this column prior to submission to the FT and our own editorial involvement. The FT editorial code of conduct specifically prohibits the use of AI in the writing process.” Druckenmiller’s op-ed also included numerous phrases that sound like writing generated by AI, including: “There is a quieter cost, too” and “This wasn’t liquidity management, it was price management.” A Pangram test https://x.com/Claudia Sahm/status/2092232595064934904?s=46 posted on social media by the economist Claudia Sahm found that “100 percent of this text is AI.” Druckenmiller denied that “the whole thing” was written with AI and said that he rejected many of the AI’s suggestions during the writing process. Some media experts have expressed concern about the proliferation of the tool. Chris Roberts, an associate professor at the University of Alabama specializing in journalism ethics, said “using AI raises questions about how much time and thought actually went into the piece.” “We see a ton of this. We’re going to see more of this,” Roberts said. “Any time you take humans out of the process of communicating to other humans there can be blowback when the words or the intent is wrong, or it doesn’t sound like a human.” Druckenmiller dismissed the use of the tool as unimportant because the op-ed reflected his intended meaning. “I don’t know why this is relevant,” Druckenmiller said. “My name is on the piece. It’s my message.”