Build the Future, Don’t Block It

Originally published on Substack. 

Welcome back. It has been busy with moving to a new house nearby and traveling. My newsletter may be less frequent during this time. Let’s dig into the issue today. First…

Three points for policymakers

1. The problem is often government failure, not data centers.
2. The answer is honest pricing, clear rules, and more supply.
3. Bigger government is not the solution to every new technology.

Humans First of AI

A new fight over AI data centers is testing whether policymakers still believe in building.

The group Humans First⁠ describes itself as a conservative social movement seeking an “America First” approach to AI. It argues that AI is built on American land, trained on American data, powered by American energy, and rooted in taxpayer-funded research, so everyday Americans deserve a say in how it develops.

No community should be steamrolled by secret deals, hidden subsidies, or unwarranted infrastructure costs shifted onto families. Families do not want higher electric bills. Property owners deserve respect. Local leaders should demand transparency. But legitimate concerns can still lead to the wrong answer.

Humans First is organizing a July 18 National Day of Data Center Protests⁠ against what it calls the unchecked expansion of AI data centers. The group highlights concerns over secrecy, national security, water use, energy demand, pollution, land use, and noise.nThose issues matter. But classical liberals should be careful not to turn concern about process into opposition to progress.

Some on the right now sound too comfortable using bigger government to stop things they dislike. Some on the left have long used regulation to slow energy, housing, infrastructure, and innovation. Different slogans, same mistake: treating political control as the answer to scarcity.

Data centers are not just buildings full of servers. They are the infrastructure behind artificial intelligence, cloud computing, cybersecurity, logistics, finance, medical research, education, and the next generation of productivity tools. If America refuses to build them, China will not wait for us.

Government failure is the real energy problem

Families are worried about whether the grid can handle new demand without raising their bills. That concern is real because too many states have restricted reliable generation, slowed permitting, blocked transmission, and layered costly mandates onto the grid.

Data centers expose these weaknesses. They did not create them.

Blaming data centers for higher electricity prices while blocking power plants, pipelines, transmission, and market pricing gets the cause backward. The solution is not less innovation. It is more reliable energy.

Accountability beats obstruction

Companies should pay the real costs of the power, water, land, and infrastructure they use. They should not receive special subsidies or shift costs onto households.

But honest pricing is different from blanket opposition.

Policymakers should require transparency for public agreements, protect property rights, reject special tax carveouts, and ensure companies pay their way. Then they should allow investment, construction, and innovation to proceed.

This is not unchecked expansion. It is clear rules and accountability.

Scarcity is not limited government

The real danger is letting fear turn into a cross-partisan scarcity agenda.

We have seen this pattern before. Stop homes, then complain housing is unaffordable. Stop energy, then complain electricity is expensive. Stop infrastructure, then complain America is falling behind.

That is not limited government. It is NIMBYism with a government stamp.

A better agenda would speed up permitting for reliable power and grid infrastructure, remove barriers to water and energy investment, protect local property owners from coercive siting, and avoid panic-driven moratoriums that weaken America’s technological edge without solving the underlying problem.

This connects with my recent work. In Stop Regulating Yesterday’s Media Market⁠, I argued policymakers should stop using outdated boxes and follow how consumers actually behave. In Fathers Help Families Prosper⁠, I wrote that government cannot replace fathers and should stop making family life harder. And in my state budget work, the lesson is the same: government should stop creating scarcity and start removing barriers to flourishing.

The future will not be free. Nothing is. But innovation, productivity, and growth can far exceed their costs when markets work and government gets the rules right.
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Classical liberals should not lead with “no.” We should lead with a better “yes”: yes to reliable energy, property rights, transparency, and innovation.