President Trump is inflicting tariffs on America in a vain attempt to revive traditional manufacturing. Private investment is gushing instead into data centers, where the AI economy is being hatched.

The U.S. is the epicenter of this global investment boom in data centers, which support the internet, cloud computing and the training of ever-more capable artificial intelligence models. Spending on data centers is growing exponentially. Much of it comes from the “hyperscalers” like Amazon, Microsoft, Google, Meta, Oracle and OpenAI. The first four of these digital giants alone plowed $425 billion last year into centers, a figure expected to top $600 billion this year.

Surging capital investment in data centers and AI has helped propel the stock market to new heights. And for now, at least, it is making America the world’s foremost computing superpower, the pace car in a race against China and others to master AI. More than 4,000 data centers — almost 40 percent of the world total — are located here, compared to just 368 in China.

However, the U.S. digital goldrush is running into a groundswell of local resistance.

In Virginia, which has the nation’s biggest concentration of data centers (570), voters are having second thoughts. Three years ago, 69 percent said they were comfortable with new data centers in their community. That number has since dropped to 35 percent, with 59 percent voicing discomfort. Prince William County has nixed plans for a 1,700-acre campus near the Manassas civil war battlefield, which would have hosted dozens of data centers.

Maine recently became the first state to pause building large data centers pending a study of its energy needs. And Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) are pushing a bill in Washington to impose a national moratorium on construction.

The backlash springs from three main sources. First and most pervasive is the fear of soaring electricity bills. Data centers have a voracious appetite for power, putting pressure on utilities to generate more and upgrade local grids to transmit it. Residents worry that it portends higher monthly bills, even as energy costs already are rising faster than inflation. The centers also consume large volumes of water to cool servers, which could mean shortages and higher water bills. That has made them especially controversial in the desert West.

Second, a majority of Americans say they’re anxious about losing their jobs to AI. Such fears may be premature, but they cannot be airily dismissed. And while initially welcomed for creating construction jobs and generating substantial property tax revenues, data centers, essentially warehouses crammed with servers, have turned out to be only modest as job creators. An average facility might employ around 200 people.

Read more in The Hill

Having paused U.S. attacks on Iran, can President Trump be persuaded to suspend hostilities against Europe as well?

His reckless rhetorical overkill is making the transatlantic alliance collateral damage in operation Epic Fury.

Trump has called key European allies “cowards” for not coming to America’s aid — specifically to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. He has dismissed NATO as a “paper tiger” and threatened to pull the U.S. out of the collective security pact.

He upped the ante earlier this week, comparing United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer to his Hitler-appeasing predecessor, Neville Chamberlain.

Accusing our NATO partners of being faithless allies is chutzpah on stilts. Trump didn’t consult European leaders before impulsively joining Israel Feb. 28 in launching air strikes against Iran and its Middle East proxies. Nor could he produce evidence to back his claim of an “imminent” Iranian threat to the U.S.

Keep reading in The Hill.

There’s a particular type of lie that dominates American political discourse these days. It’s not a factual lie, but a conceptual mistruth: the promise that you can make life more affordable without actually making anything cheaper. Call it affordability theater.

Whether they march to the MAGA drumbeat or roost on the progressive left, populists share a need for scapegoats. To inflame public passions and convert them into votes, each side vows to stop nefarious villains from destroying America.

President Trump has built his political career upon demagogic attacks on “criminal aliens” and “radical left lunatics” who “hate America.” Progressive politicians, clearly envious of Trump’s grip on working-class voters, believe they can pry it loose by focusing their ire on billionaires instead.

That’s a long shot. Trump is the greatest of all time when it comes to mastering what author William Galston, in an illuminating new book, calls the “dark passions” shaping today’s politics — anger, fear and domination.

Trump’s populist elixir is more potent because it fuses working Americans’ cultural and economic grievances. While progressives fixate on the uneven distribution of wealth and power, non-college voters have more immediate concerns — the high cost of living — and worry that Democrats still lean too far left on social issues.

Read more in The Hill

The fog of war seems to have enveloped President Trump and his minions. After two weeks of armed conflict with Iran, they have yet to offer a lucid and realistic explanation of America’s war aims.

The White House’s failure to dispatch top officials to last Sunday’s talk shows to drum up public support for the war was telling. Apparently, none could be trusted to speak for a president who himself lurches incoherently from one rationale to another.

Meanwhile, political battle lines have hardened at home. Republican lawmakers rubber stamp whatever Trump wants, while Democrats demand a halt to hostilities, pending a vote on a war powers resolution.

With American forces engaged in combat, this isn’t the best moment for a polarizing domestic fight over constitutional prerogatives. But Democrats are right to insist that the president bring his case for war before Congress for hearings, questions and debate.

Read more in The Hill

George Washington’s tenacity in winning our war of independence (with French help), after losing many battles, forms the dramatic arc of Ken Burn’s gripping documentary, “The American Revolution.”

Looking ahead to this year’s midterm elections, Democrats should take the long view like Washington. As important as it is to win the House and possibly the Senate in November, it’s even more crucial for Democrats to take back the White House in 2028.

Taking control of the House would give heretofore impotent Democrats some ability to check President Trump’s flagrant abuses of presidential power. They could freeze funding for his outlandish decrees and probe his brazen politicization of federal law enforcement agencies and meddling in state elections.

The party out of power usually makes gains in midterm elections, and Democrats need only flip three seats to control the House. They are also riding a tailwind from Trump’s unpopular policies. By large margins, the public disapproves of his handling the economy, inflation and his signature issue, immigration.

Yet Trump’s fall doesn’t signal Democrats’ rise. Voters still trust Republicans more to address most of their top concerns. That’s why even a House and Senate sweep wouldn’t stop today’s realignment of U.S. politics along educational lines. It’s given Republicans a structural advantage because their base — non-college voters — constitute a supermajority (nearly 60 percent) and are spread more evenly across the country.

Read more in The Hill

November’s US elections were Donald Trump’s first real electoral test since he swept to victory for the second time a year ago, and they produced plenty of results for the Republicans to be concerned about. The Democratic party did about as well as it could hope for, especially so given the party is without a central figure who could lead the opposition to Trump and crystallise to voters what the Democrats stand for.

The dynamic Zohran Mamdani attracted most of the attention this side of the Atlantic with his stunning win to become the new mayor of New York City, gaining plaudits from prominent Labour politicians including his London counterpart Sadiq Khan and members of the parliamentary Labour party. Mamdani’s campaign has been admired for its ground and social media mobilisation, especially when centre-left parties seem to be behind the populist right when it comes to commanding online attention.

The elections of two new Democrat governors in Virginia and New Jersey, however, may tell us more about what is happening in America than winning the mayoralty in a state that hasn’t voted Republican for 40 years. Abigail Spanberger took back the Virginia governorship from the Republicans, winning by 15 points, and Rep. Mikie Sherrill won by 13 points in New Jersey. At the 2024 presidential election, Kamala Harris won Virginia by just 5 points and New Jersey by 6 points. She won New York City by nearly 40 points.

Keep reading in Fabian Society’s Bottom Line.