AI a potent wedge issue in U.S. midterms

Americans head to the polls again in November with no shortage of issues at stake. The White House’s weaponization of tariffs, immigration crackdown, government purges and foreign adventurism have roiled the nation. But calls to rein in artificial intelligence (AI) may ultimately gain the most traction for candidates.

The Trump administration’s AI Action Plan, released last summer, promises to assert U.S. technological dominance at breakneck speed. The strategy vows Washington will dismantle barriers to data centre construction, eliminate a raft of “woke” safety measures and lean on other nations to buy American tech.

Silicon Valley evangelists have fully bought in. Amazon, Meta, Google and Microsoft alone have announced US$650 billion in AI-related spending for 2026. That eclipses the GDP of countries such as Israel or Norway. It also doesn’t factor in other venture capital investments elsewhere, or outlays from OpenAI, Anthropic or the Elon Musk-owned xAI.

A market strategist told the Wall Street Journal last month that the U.S. could plausibly be in a recession if it weren’t for AI investments. Although this isn’t necessarily a good thing. America’s economic growth “has become so dependent on AI-related investment and wealth,” the paper reported,” that if the boom turns to bust, it could take the broader economy with it.”

Indeed, even Microsoft’s boss is starting to sound uneasy with the brewing implications of the hyper-concentration of money and power within the AI industry.

“For this not to be a bubble by definition, it requires that the benefits of this are much more evenly spread,” CEO Satya Nadella said to the Financial Times at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in late January.

American voters seem particularly irked by the explosion in data centre construction, which is stoking higher energy prices. Consulting giant McKinsey forecasts nearly US$7 trillion worth of global investment into the facilities is needed before 2030 to keep pace with AI demand.

Yet survey data released in November show a plurality of U.S. voters — 41 per cent — now support a ban on building data centres near their homes. And some local activists are mobilizing co-ordinated pressure campaigns. Last year, more than two dozen projects were reportedly cancelled across the U.S. due to local pushback.

Populists on opposite ends of the political spectrum are also finding common ground in opposing an unfettered tech industry.

Florida’s Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis has called for an AI “Bill of Rights.” He proposes comprehensive legislation to tackle harmful deepfakes and require companies to notify customers when they are interacting with customer service AI agents. Among other things, it would also allow parents to access their children’s chatbot history logs and limit insurance companies from relying solely on AI to adjust or deny claims.

Sen. Bernie Sanders has pushed for similar actions. The godfather of America’s current progressive movement released a report in October headlined “The Big Tech Oligarchs’ War Against Workers.” It warns AI could erase 100 million American jobs within a decade and proposes a robot tax on large corporations, among a range of other pro-worker policies.

Elsewhere, MAGA luminary Steve Bannon says Silicon Valley seeks to create a system of “techno-feudalism” to enslave the working class. Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez claims overheated tech stocks risk “2008 style threats to economic stability.”

Tensions are also swirling between Washington and state governments. More than 1,000 proposed bills to regulate AI were introduced at the state level in 2025. Yet U.S. President Donald Trump in December signed an executive order to withhold federal funds from states trying to regulate AI. Doing so risks eroding Republican candidates’ appeal among independent voters.

This is especially true in the wake of Elon Musk’s AI model Grok enraging lawmakers and users worldwide after its new image editing feature recently generated millions of lewd images, including tens of thousands of sexualized depictions of children.

But the tech industry is already rolling out its war chest in response. Meta spearheaded the launch of a California-based super political action committee last year to enable dark money to tear down lawmakers keen on regulating AI. All told, the tech industry’s most ardent boosters collectively spent more than US$109 million to lobby the White House in 2025.

Still, surveys by the Pew Research Center last summer found U.S. voters are increasingly more concerned than excited about AI’s growing presence in daily life. This included 50 per cent of Republicans and 51 per cent of Democrats.

Expect politicians of all stripes on the ballot this fall to try to wield those fears to their advantage.

Kyle Volpi Hiebert is a Montreal-based political risk analyst focused on globalization, conflict and emerging technologies.