Trump faces AI backlash from unions and data-center critics: Analysis

The emerging coalition of religious leaders, labor unions, and local activists concerned about artificial intelligence and the broader economic turmoil it heralds poses a political problem for anyone who gets on the wrong side of this issue.. And President Donald Trump is the person most at risk.

Artificial intelligence is positioned right at its political blind spot. The industry and its rapidly evolving technology threaten to overwhelm Trump’s often uncanny ability to sense shifts in political winds and could harm his party’s chances in the midterm elections and the long-term legacy he cherishes.

Even though Trump seems to be aware of the danger, he can’t help running towards it.

On Thursday, he highlighted nationwide fears that a surge in data center construction would increase Americans’ energy bills, citing commitments from data center developers and service providers not to raise electricity prices. This commitment is a simple promise for the likes of OpenAI and SeerThe complex economics of making changes to the United States’ aging grids continue over years and decades, providing them with political cover.

But Trump couldn’t help but align himself with the companies, even at an event at the Environmental Protection Agency, pledging to show he was looking out for the little boy. He encouraged assembled governors and other local officials to sell their constituents to data centers. “You can’t fight it. You have to go with it,” he said.

He told the audience that someone is going to get rich developing data centers, and that someone could be you. “If you don’t take that money, someone else will. You can do it yourself.”

That’s the thing about being rich. If Americans sense the possibility of this happening to them, they don’t need to be told twice to get behind it. That’s why crypto and prediction markets are ideas that can’t be destroyed, no matter how slim your chances of personally getting rich from them are.

But when it comes to artificial intelligence, ordinary Americans don’t buy the idea that Big Tech has given them a golden lottery ticket. Trump can tout the stock market rally all he wants – Nasdaq composite There have been 20 record closes this year — but too few Americans have enough shares in the market for rising share prices of a select few tech companies and the indexes that include them to overcome their concerns about job instability and continued wealth concentration.

So Elon Musk’s SpaceX It seemed like a great opportunity for those who could invest early. Shares of Regular Joes who were lucky enough to have a few dollars in a brokerage account at the time of the IPO last month fell 30%.

And now add to AI’s issues of class and wealth a heavyweight political coalition that has influence over the voters Trump wants to persuade most.

The president may be willing to write off Pope Leo XIV, who issued a powerful encyclical in May warning that artificial intelligence needed guardrails to protect our humanity. But when it comes to the heart of the evangelical movement in the United States, Trump cannot so easily erase the same language.

Walter Kim, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, praised the pope’s warnings about artificial intelligence. “It has positive benefits, but it also has extraordinary harms,” ​​Kim said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” on Wednesday.

Kim worried that the prominence of artificial intelligence in healthcare, education and warfare risked putting humans out of the loop in our most important decisions.

“As the Pope described in his last encyclical, the construction of the Tower of Babel, the trust in a technology that reflects human arrogance, alienates us not only from God, but also from each other,” Kim said.

Kim’s evangelical group does not support candidates and has not threatened any open political campaigns against Trump. But Kim’s message is a warning sign that the ground is shifting even among the voting bloc that has supported Trump since early in his first presidential run.

Other groups whose support Trump and GOP politicians may want to win are being even more outspoken. Republicans have had mixed success with a push for union support under Trump. If they want to win the support of unions, this will increasingly require taking AI concerns more seriously.

Liz ShulerThe president of the AFL-CIO, the largest labor federation in the United States, made this clear at the union’s convention last month.

“To all the candidates running for president in 2028, if you want to hold the highest office in the land, hear these words: Working people must come before algorithms,” he said.

Shuler doesn’t claim to be against AI, but he does want more help from tech companies and their investors about the new technology. So is it Sean O’BrienPresident of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters speaking at the Republican National Convention in 2024. “We never had a seat at the table,” he said. Latest event with Palantir CEO Alex Karp It was organized by the centre-right group American Compass.

Karp, who grew up in a union family, said: “I think the biggest challenge is “AI in this country is political unrest.”

The potential for this unrest is evident in the uproar against data centers across the country.

Liberal New York state may be the first to impose a moratorium on building data centers under Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration. But so far the issue has not polarized along familiar lines. A majority of conservative Republicans (53%) oppose building data centers locally, according to one survey. June survey By the Yale Program on Climate Communication.

A majority, or 58%, of registered voters in the survey shared their opposition to local data center construction, as did 74% of liberal Democrats..

A broad coalition of the religious right, labor unions, and local activists are coming together to tell AI to “slow it down.” Politicians who listen will find a strong source of support behind them.

Those who don’t? There are only 101 days until Election Day in November.