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The AI industry, which is currently struggling with public concerns about job losses and skyrocketing energy costs, is making accusations against Chinese entities. They are alleged to be using social media platforms to artificially stir up discontent over the construction of large data centers, which are the foundation of the American technological leap.
The significance of this event lies in the fact that amid the fierce race between Washington and Beijing for absolute leadership in the AI sphere, active local resistance to infrastructure expansion threatens the industry’s large-scale plans to deploy facilities in the United States. That is why tech executives are convinced that external forces are behind the wave of internal public discontent.
The current state of affairs demonstrates that organizations that support technology are closely monitoring coordinated streams of social media posts. They believe that these messages are generated by networks of bots whose activities are directly controlled by China, its official representatives, or other states under Beijing’s geopolitical influence.
Steve DelBianco, CEO of NetChoice, a specialized technology sector association, noted that US citizens are naturally anxious about the rapid development of AI for many reasons, and this psychological factor makes them vulnerable to disinformation campaigns aimed at infrastructure.
For their part, opponents of large-scale data center construction reject these accusations. They claim that representatives of the AI community have simply transformed China into a convenient scapegoat to divert attention from the very real, documented, and justified protests that are erupting in numerous American communities. Activist Elena Schlossberg, who is leading the movement against the expansion of such facilities in Northern Virginia, said in a commentary for Axios that she personally saw the absolutely natural origin of this resistance, as she directly communicates with residents of different parts of the country who are looking for ways to protect their regions from excessive industrialization.
Although AI lobbyists admit that it is impossible to accurately calculate the share of anti-infrastructure publications created by Chinese entities or their satellites, they claim to have recorded several recent massive waves of activity coming from foreign IP addresses. Among the recorded examples are the following messages:
- On May 22, an account on platform X localized in South Asia posted a post questioning the sanity of billionaires investing huge amounts of money in AI and building facilities everywhere, provoking massive layoffs and pretending that this will not have negative consequences
- On May 25, a profile from Africa reported that Mark Zuckerberg had built a giant complex in Georgia right next to residential buildings, causing people to lose water pressure, bathrooms to stop working, buildings to shake constantly, and blackouts to become a daily reality. This post was based on actual journalistic materials published in the New York Times.
- On May 26, a user from Poland posted a post marked as breaking news, claiming that BlackRock CEO Larry Fink predicted that trillion-dollar spending on power grids and data centers for AI would be financed solely by the savings and retirement savings of ordinary Americans. This statement was based on Fink’s own analytical forecasts.
A Facebook page called “Indiana Life” located in Bangladesh was also discovered, which has 44 thousand subscribers and regularly generates content about the destructive impact of infrastructure facilities on this state. Another Bangladeshi page called “Kansas Life” is similarly active, focusing on discrediting projects in Kansas. Beyond that, other accounts, some of which are registered in South Asia and North Africa, focus their audience’s attention on criticism and protests around the Stratos project, a massive forty-thousand-acre data center complex planned for northwestern Utah.
A well-known financial investor and television personality, Kevin O’Leary, who is a financial donor to the construction in Utah, openly accused Beijing of spreading false information and artificially inciting people. According to NBC, O’Leary is now forced to scale back the project due to serious public pressure. However, people who oppose the construction of this project steadfastly maintain that their dissatisfaction is purely sincere and independent.
At the same time, the results of sociological surveys show that the level of approval of the construction of such facilities among the population of the United States is extremely low, and representatives of the AI industry have to admit that such sentiments are formed not only under the influence of China. In particular, a survey conducted by the Gallup Institute in May revealed that 71% of American citizens oppose the construction of such complexes within their localities. Opponents of the industry justify their position by quite specific factors: the expectation of rising electricity tariffs, huge volumes of water consumption, and constant noise generated by powerful cooling systems. In addition, many people emphasize environmental risks.
As for further developments, representatives of pro-technology organizations have announced their intention to appeal to the US Congress to draw the attention of lawmakers to what they see as a Chinese-driven campaign to block the construction. Chuck Flint, who heads the Coalition for Affordability and Prosperity, an organization that has consistently fought against the introduction of regulatory restrictions on the industry, has formally called on the heads of the relevant congressional intelligence committees to conduct a thorough investigation into foreign interference aimed at slowing down the pace of infrastructure creation.
Taylor Budovich, founder of the Innovation Council Action Inc. and former Trump administration official, emphasized that the spread of false anti-technology narratives through foreign social media profiles requires an immediate and tough response from the US parliament. At the same time, House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Jason Smith voiced accusations against certain American nonprofit organizations, claiming that they receive financial support from China to organize domestic resistance to technology projects.
The position of the other side was clearly outlined by Tim Donahoe, head of research programs at Greenpeace USA, in a conversation with Axios, noting that the desire of any large corporation to avoid objective criticism by appealing to theories about “external provocateurs” looks like a trivial and lazy step that offends local communities trying to protect their basic and legitimate interests.
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