Somewhere out there is a Republican who just learned the word “moratorium” and loves it. Congratulations. You found policy alignment with Bernie Sanders.
Let’s review the record. Sanders was the first member of Congress to demand a halt on new AI data centers. In March, he and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez filed the Artificial Intelligence Data Center Moratorium Act to freeze construction nationwide. That was predictable. Socialists have never met a private investment they didn’t want to pause, study, tax, and then pause again.
What nobody predicted was the far right lining up behind him. Ron DeSantis rolled out an AI “bill of rights” so Florida communities can block data centers. Michigan’s Republican Senate nominee endorsed a one-year construction pause. A Kentucky Republican legislator announced that some folks simply want rural communities to stay rural. Republicans have even floated statewide bans in places like Georgia and Virginia.
Even President Trump noticed. His warning was blunt: China could not be happier with this anti Data Center movement. He is right. Every project killed in Georgia or Michigan is a gift to Beijing in the race for the technology that will define the next century.
Here is the irony. The same voices who spent years shouting about American dominance now want to hand the most important industry of the decade to someone else. You cannot chant “America First” and then vote to make America last in AI.
Texas is a cautionary tale. A June poll found 56 percent of Texans oppose a data center in their community. Texas leaders slowed down. Then Texas elected a new governor. The times are changing over there, and not in a way that builds anything.
Louisiana took a different road. Meta’s Hyperion project is rising in Richland Parish. A $10 billion AI campus has been proposed near River Bend. Gov. Landry has called out the special interests from outside Louisiana pushing the opposition. That is how a state wins: it says yes when others flinch.
Data centers mean construction jobs, permanent jobs, a broader tax base, and a seat at the table for the industry that will shape every other industry. Rural parishes that have watched young people leave for decades now have a reason for them to stay.
So to the conservatives auditioning for Bernie’s backup choir: the costume is not convincing. Real conservatives build. They compete. They beat China.
Louisiana should keep building. Let the elephant-print socialists keep pausing.