AI firms dump $256M into midterms amid data center backlash

AI firms are lobbying to have their data centers built as both sides – Democrats and Republicans – across the aisle hold negative views on them.

President Trump seems to be the only one currently in American politics to be supportive of data centers, having made things harder for Republicans in the midterms when he endorsed AI data centers being built across the country.

According to an Economist/YouGov poll, only 14 percent of Democrats and 31 percent of Republicans think new data centers are a positive thing for the country as the controversial driver of the AI boom has faced backlash amid concerns of high electricity prices and draining water supplies.

Trump disagrees, however, writing in a post on Truth Social on Monday, he said:

“The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor,

“If they want to be successful and rich, with far lower taxes and jobs all over the place, let Data Reign.”

AI firms are feeling the intense push-back regarding their data centers and are now on the political offensive to make sure they get built with the five biggest tech companies — Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Meta and Oracle pouring millions of dollars into an already record-setting midterm cycle of corporate spending.

One super PAC called ‘Leading the Future’ has raised $140 million with plans to donate them to pro-data center candidates of both parties, according to Reuters.

The donations include $50 million from the influential pro-AI venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz and another combined $25 million from Greg Brockman, the president of OpenAI, and his wife Anna, according to the Federal Election Commission.

While on the Anthropic side, $40 million have been allocated through a nonprofit called Public First Action which already has $100 million in reserve, along with Musk’s super PAC which holds a similar amount.

Finally, Facebook owner Meta is linked to a variety of PACs with tens of millions of dollars at the ready for the election, pushing the figure all-in-all to a record breaking $265 million in funds for the midterms.

“The moral of the story is, trying to bypass communities in developing these data centers is not working, and they’re going to take it to the polls,” Nicol Turner Lee, director of the Center for Technology Innovation at Brookings, told The Independent.