Conventional wisdom insists that artificial intelligence has the worst public relations ever. This is ironic, given that AI is supposed to be curing cancer, yet it can’t even come up with a PR plan to make itself less hated. Perhaps the failure is inherent to the product, not its communications strategy.
We see this with the debate over data centers, which have done the impossible in our divided, 50/50 nation: They have united Americans from all walks of life against them, including supermajorities of both political parties.
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Faced with this, has the AI industry done some introspection and considered where its business plans or execution ran astray? Of course not! It is blaming its marketing staff and China.
The latest is a breathless news item from Axios that X has found 200 Chinese X accounts that were posting against U.S. data centers. Missing from the story: X has about 45,000,000 monthly U.S. posters, meaning the fearsome “China op” was by 0.0004% of accounts posting. The GOP’s problem is that this China op misdirection has reached some GOP campaigns in swing districts.
But there are scores of good reasons to be against data centers, the AI industry, and AI itself. The failure of the GOP to understand this, or its fear of crossing the president, who is enamored of the technology but, take note, not facing the voters this fall, could cost it winnable seats, and maybe control of Congress.
It’s time for a reality check and an emergency reset by the party.
First off: Mao Zedong and Xi Jinping did not invent NIMBY. No one wants a data center in their neighborhood. Permanent noise, a horrible eyesore, lower property values — these are reasons enough to oppose them.
What’s more, contrary to AI front-group economic “studies,” no one believes data centers are going to be “lowering electricity bills,” because the premise is absurd. More demand for a limited resource raises prices for that resource. Massively higher demand for a limited resource will massively raise prices.
To be told by a GOP lawmaker that you oppose data centers because of China is the most foolish campaign message since “you’re wrong to think you are struggling in this economy.” Likewise, to be told by a Tech Bro that flyover country bumpkins should leave data center decisions to the experts sounds suspiciously like what “experts” told us during COVID-19 as they shut down schools and ordered masks on 2-year-olds.
More fundamentally, AI proponents completely misunderstand the root of data center opposition: Data centers poll as favorably as nuclear waste because opposition to data centers is the only way, until Election Day, that regular people can try to slow down AI adoption.
The AI industry’s messaging has been clear and disturbing: they are coming for your job, they want sweetheart tax exemptions — Ohio gave them $1.6 billion in tax relief in 2025 alone — they are going to steal your copyrighted intellectual property “without permission or payment,” they may bring about the end of humanity, and your children are going to have chatbot friends, lovers, and therapists.
How can anyone be surprised that people oppose the data centers that make these things possible?
With Beltway politicians seemingly captured by Big Tech, juries of regular people and state attorneys general are filling the void to rein in social media and AI companies. Even communist China is banning AI companies from manipulating children.
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Where is Congress? September should be the month the GOP Congress declares its independence from AI CEOs. Banning AI chatbots, for example, that impersonate humans when interacting with children would be good policy and send a clear signal to voters that the GOP will police AI industry excesses.
Regular people are standing up to those foisting unwanted AI and its data centers upon them. Congress should meet people where they are, or GOP members in close races may end up sacrificing their jobs for liberal tech titans who would never return the favor.
Michael Paranzino is a policy and communications consultant and former GOP staffer.
