Republicans and Democrats don’t agree on much these days. But they do agree that “affordability”  is the biggest issue in the electorate, and solving it may determine the winners and losers of the upcoming election.
That is where the agreement ends.
The solutions for dealing with affordability could not be any different.
For proof, look at the proposals coming from deep-blue California and Texas, which is still a red state despite the wishes of the New York Times.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott recently unveiled his six-point plan to increase affordability in Texas. According to the most cited affordability index of the 50 states (C2ER COL Index), Texas is already the 15th most affordable state. Still, the governor, up for reelection this year to a 4th term, recognizes the issue&#8217;s importance and wants to move Texas higher in the rankings.
His proposal includes:
<ul class="ul1">
<li class="li1">Reducing property taxes by capping annual appraisal growth and making it harder for governments to increase spending.</li>
<li class="li1">Rather than rely on government bureaucrats to give building permits, allow third-party permitting and create pre-approved home designs that would automatically be permitted.</li>
<li class="li1">Allow a new “essential benefits” health insurance plan to reduce those costs.</li>
<li class="li1">Create competition for municipally owned monopoly electric utilities and forbid governments from diverting utility revenue to pay for unrelated spending.</li>
<li class="li1">Continue the freeze on state college tuition.</li>
<li class="li1">Expand safe driving discounts to lower auto insurance costs.</li>
</ul>
It’s a brilliant plan. Much of the increase in costs for the average person has been caused by increased government spending, taxes, and regulation. Or, in some cases, regulation that prevents the private sector from offering a more cost-effective product. This plan is aimed directly at improving those conditions.
And it makes changes that should affect housing and energy costs, insurance, and tuition – things that will impact virtually every Texan.
How is California dealing with affordability?
Apparently, not well. According to the same C2ER COL affordability index, California is the 3rd least affordable state. Only Hawaii and Massachusetts have a higher cost of living than California. Without question, the affordability problem is much, much greater in California than in Texas.
Therefore, California must have a much bigger and more aggressive plan to deal with the problem than Texas, right?
Oh, ye of little blue state understanding.
Accepting the gravity of the issue, California Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas (D-San Benito) gave an address at the start of the current legislative session, vowing to tackle the problem. In April 2025, he created three select committees to recommend ways to lower costs. The titles of these committees are instructive and vary quite significantly in what Texas is focused on. Those titles are: CalFresh Enrollment and Nutrition; Child Care Costs; and Housing Finance and Affordability.
Sixteen months later, those select committees have produced…nothing.
Governor Gavin Newsom, distracted while trying to become your president by moving to the Left of AOC, has touted some bond issues on the November ballot that will give handouts to certain Democrat constituencies and will no doubt be loaded with fraud like every other California program, and a housing bill that slows down the next set of expensive housing regulations but removes few of the existing ones.
The problem for Democrats is simple. Their policies on climate, unions, government spending, taxes, and regulation are the very things that drive up the cost of everything. Only two of the 20 most affordable states are blue states (New Mexico and Minnesota). For California to truly address the problem, it needs to undo much of what the legislature and governor have done in the last 20 years. But that would be an admission of failure. One trait of Democrats is that they never admit that a policy has failed. If it isn’t working, it is only because they didn’t do enough of it.
So, California Democrats will continue to talk about affordability and blame high costs on Trump, while doing nothing except make the situation worse. Maybe they’ll look to New York for additional ideas on how to implement bad policies, perhaps government-run grocery stores?
In Scottsdale, Arizona, a few years ago, I bought my go-to McDonald’s meal I have been buying for decades: a quarter-pounder with cheese, medium fries, and a milk. Then I got on a plane and bought the exact same meal in Costa Mesa, California, the next day. It cost 70% more in California. The ingredients are the same. The difference, though, is the additional insurance, regulatory, legal, tax, and other costs the California franchisee has to build into the price of that burger, which will probably get even cheaper in the Lone Star State.
God bless Texas.
***
John Campbell was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. He is a Certified Public Accountant, businessman, and former member of Congress who served from 2005 to 2015. He also has a 25-year career in the retail automotive industry, progressing from Corporate Controller to owner/operator and dealer principal, and represented 15 franchises during his career.

US Dollar Origami Bird Flying Creative Concept

Why The Battle For The Middle Class Runs Through Austin And Sacramento

affordability

california

gavin newsom

greg abbott

politics

texas

The Texas State Board of Education is advancing a <a href="https://sboe.texas.gov/state-board-of-education/content-advisor-consensus-document-aug-sept-2026-ss-hs-combined-1.pdf">rewrite of high school history,</a> government, and geography standards that includes explicit language tying the September 11 terrorist attacks to radical Islam. 
On Tuesday, the Republican majority preliminarily approved the proposed changes over strong objections from Texas Muslims, with the final vote expected Friday. The revisions would affect the social studies curriculum for Texas high school students and drew strong reactions from the packed public hearings. 
“I feel attacked, as if my religion doesn’t belong,” Habiiba Quresh, 15, <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2026/08/31/texas-rewrite-social-studies-high-school/?utm_source">told</a> the GOP-dominated board. “I shouldn’t have to defend my religion in the middle of history class because of one sentence someone on this board wrote.”
The revised curriculum standards would require students to “identify the significance of September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks motivated by radical Islam.” Students would also learn about the violent history surrounding Islam’s rise, including “Prophet Mohammed’s brutal military campaigns against Jewish and Christian tribes, the normalization of slavery, and the taking of female captives as harem slaves,” according to the document.
Digging deeper, the proposal would also examine the teachings of jihad and how the ideology contributed to the expansion of Islam and the conquest of Christian lands. The curriculum would also cover the modern rise of radical Islam through Iranian proxies and U.S.-designated terrorist groups, including Al Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria.
In June, the same board approved new K-8 social studies standards alongside a separate mandatory reading list for students in first through 12th grades that includes Bible passages and other classic works of literature as part of Texas’ broader effort to emphasize the state’s Judeo-Christian heritage, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-major-move-putting-god-back-in-americas-classrooms">The Daily Wire</a> previously reported. 
Multiple titles will be mandated at each grade level, including a “picture-book adaptation of the David and Goliath story” for elementary students and the story of Adam and Eve for older students. Other biblical selections include the Book of Jonah, the Book of Psalms, and excerpts from Genesis and Lamentations. The curriculum will also place greater emphasis on classic literature and culturally significant works, including Abraham Lincoln’s “Gettysburg Address.”
The move came shortly after Texas lawmakers <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/court-rules-that-the-ten-commandments-arent-unconstitutional-who-knew">won a brewing legal fight</a> to require the Ten Commandments to be displayed in every public school classroom. A petition asking the U.S. Supreme Court to review the Ten Commandments rulings is pending, and could allow the justices to revisit — and potentially overturn — existing precedent.
Texas officials have faced intense scrutiny from conservative activists over the growing influence of Islam in the state, from the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/probe-launched-into-sharia-city-plan-on-u-s-soil-you-obey-americas-laws">proliferation of mosques</a> to Muslim washing stations at airports.
Last month, Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/dfw-airport-scraps-islamic-foot-washing-stations-after-governor-threatens-its-funding">scrapped plans</a> to add Islamic foot-washing stations to two Terminal D restrooms after Texas Governor Greg Abbott called the plan illegal and threatened to cut off state funding. 
“These ablution facilities appear designed to single out one subset of the population for special treatment based on religion. That is illegal,” Abbott <a href="https://gov.texas.gov/uploads/files/press/Airport_USDOT_Letter_FINAL.pdf">wrote</a> in a letter to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.  
On the Democratic side, state representative and Senate hopeful James Talarico (D-TX) has helped lead the opposition to Texas adopting Bible-centered curriculum and teaching history that highlights the country’s Christian roots.
“I consider the Hindu student, the Jewish student, the Muslim student, the Buddhist student, the atheist student who sits in a classroom in a Texas public school to be my neighbor, and as a Christian, I am called to love them as myself. And forcing my religion down their throats is not love,” Talarico <a href="https://x.com/jamestalarico/status/1861147608149811689?s=20">said</a> in 2024 while discussing an elementary curriculum change.
“I think if Jesus read this new curriculum, he would weep for those students, and then I think he would overturn our desks in the Texas Legislature,” he added.

9 11 Calendar with the date of September 11

Red State History Classes Could Soon Teach The Radical Islam Behind 9/11

curriculum standards

james talarico

september 11 attacks

texas state board of education

President Donald Trump issued a blunt warning Monday to communities pushing back against the construction of artificial intelligence data centers, arguing that opposition to the facilities could leave communities poorer while benefiting China.
“The only reason that communities throughout the U.S.A. should not want Data Centers is if they want to end up being backwards and poor,” Trump wrote in a post on <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/117190477440173795">Truth Social</a>. “If they want to be successful and rich, with far lower taxes and jobs all over the place, let Data Reign.”
“The good news is that there are plenty of other places that want them,” Trump continued. “If we kill the Golden Goose, you will only have yourselves to blame.” Trump also invoked the central geopolitical argument behind his support for the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure, writing, “China could not be happier with this anti Data Center movement. Actually, they can’t believe it is happening!”
The president’s comments come as opposition to data centers has emerged as one of the most politically charged issues ahead of the November midterm elections. A <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/709772/americans-oppose-data-centers-area.aspx">Gallup poll</a> conducted in March found 71% of Americans opposed building a data center in their communities, including 75% of Democrats, 63% of Republicans, and 74% of independents. A <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fox-news-poll-cool-your-servers-voters-reject-data-centers">Fox News poll</a> conducted last month similarly found 70% opposed to building an AI data center in their area.
Critics have raised concerns about the enormous amounts of electricity and water consumed by the facilities as well as noise. Critics also argue that data centers can place a strain on local infrastructure and question whether nearby residents actually benefit economically from their construction.
Those concerns have also been <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/republicans-are-turning-against-data-centers-fast">voiced</a> by Republican politicians and candidates even as Trump has remained firmly committed to the data center buildout. Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott, who has broadly supported data centers, recently moved to impose new regulations on the industry and has argued that data center companies need to pay the full cost of the electrical infrastructure they require. Texas Republican Senate nominee Ken Paxton supports Abbott’s pause on new data centers.
Republican Senate candidate <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/2026/08/20/republican-mike-rogers-michigan-data-center-moratorium-01044140">Mike Rogers</a> in Michigan and Pennsylvania Republican gubernatorial nominee <a href="https://penncapital-star.com/technology-information/garrity-and-shapiro-have-accused-each-other-of-flip-flopping-on-data-centers-are-they-both-right/">Stacy Garrity</a> have also called for halts or restrictions on certain projects. On the other side of the aisle, Democratic Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro has imposed restrictions on data center development, while Democratic New York Governor Kathy Hochul <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/did-a-democratic-governor-just-hand-china-a-gift-wrapped-win">ordered</a> a one-year moratorium on certain hyperscale data centers.
Trump, however, has repeatedly rejected calls for a broader pullback. In a recent <a href="https://www.axios.com/2026/08/23/trump-data-centers-michael-cohen-interview">interview with Michael Cohen</a>, Trump argued that communities refusing data centers were “making a mistake” because the facilities bring “tremendous amounts of jobs and money.” He also claimed that data centers are increasingly being paired with their own power plants rather than relying entirely on existing electrical grids.
The administration has sought to address concerns over electricity costs through its Ratepayer Protection Pledge, under which data center operators and several governors agreed to measures intended to prevent ordinary ratepayers from being saddled with the costs of the AI buildout. Trump has also <a href="https://truthsocial.com/@realDonaldTrump/posts/116924979201330474">previously called</a> data centers “one of the biggest Driving Forces in the Future for Jobs” and signed an <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/presidential-actions/2025/07/accelerating-federal-permitting-of-data-center-infrastructure/">executive order</a> aimed at accelerating their construction.

Trump Tries To Curb Birthright Citizenship Anew After Court Loss

Trump Warns Americans Are About To ‘Kill The Golden Goose’

2026 midterm election

ai data center

artificial intelligence

donald trump

Republican leaders are increasingly turning against data center development even as the Trump administration remains staunchly in favor of building them. 
Across red states, Republicans who once welcomed the economic investment promised by artificial intelligence infrastructure are beginning to pump the brakes as constituents raise concerns about electricity prices and water consumption. 
Texas State Sen. Charles Schwertner said a July hearing revealed growing unease among Texas landowners. “After hearing hours of testimony from Texas landowners, one thing is clear: landowners deserve a fair and transparent (Certificate of Convenience and Necessity). Texans’ property rights must be protected,” he <a href="https://www.expressnews.com/business/article/texas-transmission-lines-landowners-puc-permian-22366999.php?utm_source=chatgpt.com">said</a>. 
Republicans elsewhere are not just sounding the alarm, but introducing legislation to block the tech industry’s newest wave to please their constituents. Oklahoma State Senator Kendal Sacchieri <a href="https://oksenate.gov/press-releases/senator-sacchieri-files-legislation-address-unknown-impacts-data-centers-oklahoma">wants</a> to impose a three-year statewide moratorium on new data centers. “By pausing further development, the state can gain empirical evidence on how large-scale data centers interact with Oklahoma’s infrastructure and environment, and tailor regulations that protect residents and ratepayers without undermining economic prospects,” she said. 
In key 2026 races, battleground candidates like Mike Rogers in Michigan, Tom Tiffany in Wisconsin, and Ken Paxton in Texas have all signaled increased opposition to data centers in recent weeks.
But while Republican lawmakers face pressure to slow data-center development at home, they are receiving the opposite message from the top of their party. President Donald Trump has made expanding America&#8217;s artificial intelligence infrastructure a major component of his economic and national security agenda, but in July, the president seemed to offer his fellow Republicans a compromise to bring back home. Trump <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/releases/2026/07/president-trumps-ratepayer-protection-pledge-secures-american-ai-dominance-protects-consumers/">hosted</a> an event where over 200 utilities, tech companies, and governors agreed to ensure artificial intelligence data centers are paying for their energy infrastructure without raising residential bills. This allows states to keep building data centers, but makes them pay for themselves by requiring them to BYOE (bring their own energy). 
One week later, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who was one of the governors who signed President Trump’s Ratepayer Protection Pledge at the July event, appeared to embrace that approach. Abbott announced that his administration would subject data centers seeking to connect to the Texas electric grid to an energy audit. Projects that demonstrate they can supply their own electricity could move through the review process, while those planning to draw heavily from the Texas grid could see their requests to build getting denied.
“Texans must come first,” Abbott <a href="https://gov.texas.gov/news/post/governor-abbott-directs-comprehensive-data-center-audit">said</a>. “Any project that fails to comply with the requirements set forth by the Public Utility Commission of Texas and the Electric Reliability Council of Texas must be denied connection to the Texas grid.” The governor did not say how long the review process would take. But the scale of the requests facing Texas regulators illustrates why the issue has become politically difficult to ignore.
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas is weighing connection requests that, if granted, would total more than five times the state&#8217;s record peak electricity demand, with roughly 90% of those requests coming from data centers. Texas lawmakers have warned that the “unprecedented load growth could endanger the reliability and stability of the Texas electric grid.” 
Abbott&#8217;s response seems to have left Texas business interests pleased but angered his rural base. Venture capitalist Jason Calacanis, who left Silicon Valley for Texas, emphasized that Abbott&#8217;s action was not a ban on development. “Governor Abbott announced this week an energy audit,” Calacanis <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVzYGVJ8zUk">said</a>. “Not that he’s going to slow things down, not that it’s a moratorium but that everybody has to go through an energy audit.” Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller seemed to have the same read as Calacanis, calling Abbott’s latest move “all smoke and mirrors.” 
“He [Abbott] hasn’t done anything really,” Miller <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2026/08/06/sid-miller-republicans-elections-data-centers-abbott/">said</a>. “It’s all smoke and mirrors and campaign fluff to gain votes. It’s not about the people of Texas or protecting our grid or protecting our water or protecting our land base.”

Construction At The First Stargate AI Data Center

Republicans Are Turning Against Data Centers, Fast

data center

republican party

A federal judge on Wednesday rejected Minnesota&#8217;s emergency attempt to force Texas to extradite an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/minnesota-ag-keith-ellison-sues-to-force-texas-to-extradite-ice-agent">accused</a> of shooting a Venezuelan man and lying about the incident, potentially clearing the way for the agent&#8217;s release from jail.
Christian Castro, 52, faces four counts of second-degree assault and one count of falsely reporting a crime in Minnesota over a January shooting during an immigration enforcement operation in Minneapolis.
The judge denied Minnesota&#8217;s request for a temporary restraining order that would have prevented the Cameron County sheriff from releasing Castro and required Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott to sign an extradition warrant allowing Minnesota authorities to take custody of him.
Castro has been held in Texas since May. Under existing Texas law, a person jailed while awaiting extradition can be held for up to 90 days, meaning Castro could be released as soon as Thursday, <a href="https://apnews.com/article/minnesota-texas-ice-shooting-christian-castro-extradition-384843049feeba26fac6fc09412161ca?utm_source=app&amp;utm_medium=iOS_share&amp;utm_campaign=copy_link" target="_blank" rel="noopener">according</a> to The Associated Press.
Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison sued Abbott last week to compel Castro&#8217;s extradition and sought a temporary restraining order to prevent his release while the dispute played out.
Officials in Minnesota fear Castro is a flight risk, citing calls he has made from jail to a woman in Mexico in which he talked &#8220;about marrying her and buying a house in Mexico when he is released,&#8221; the AP reported, citing the lawsuit.
In January, Castro allegedly fired a gun at a home in north Minneapolis &#8220;with the intent to cause fear of immediate bodily harm or death to the four adults who were just inside the door,&#8221; Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty said during a May news conference. The bullet hit Venezuelan migrant Julio Sosa-Celis in the leg before it traveled through a closet and into the wall of a child’s bedroom.
Castro allegedly falsely told federal investigators that Sosa-Celis and another man assaulted him with a broom handle and a snow shovel, prompting him to fire his gun in “self-defense,” Ellison said during a recent news conference.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) initially claimed that Sosa-Celis tried to “evade arrest” and “began to resist and violently assault” a federal officer. The department alleged that two individuals came out of a nearby apartment before attacking the officer “with a snow shovel and broom handle.”
Sosa-Celis then “got loose and began striking the officer with a shovel or broomstick,” DHS said at the time.
“Fearing for his life and safety,” the officer “fired a defensive shot” that hit Sosa-Celis in the leg, according to DHS. Sosa-Celis and two others “ran back into the apartment and barricaded themselves inside” before ICE took them into custody.
Then-Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons announced in February a federal probe into the incident after video footage showed that “sworn testimony provided by two separate officers appears to have made untruthful statements.”
“Lying under oath is a serious federal offense,” Lyons said at the time.
“The men and women of ICE are entrusted with upholding the rule of law and are held to the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and ethical conduct,” he said. “Violations of this sacred sworn oath will not be tolerated. ICE remains fully committed to transparency, accountability, and the fair enforcement of our nation’s immigration laws.”
A federal judge later dismissed the charges against the two migrants after the video footage emerged.
Authorities arrested Castro in Cameron County, Texas, on May 29. Four days later, Minnesota Democratic Governor Tim Walz asked Abbott to extradite Castro.
&nbsp;

Abbott Announcment

Judge Denies Minnesota’s Demands For Texas To Extradite ICE Officer

christian castro

extradition

immigration and customs enforcement

keith ellison

I moved from Seattle to Chattanooga in 2021. My house in Seattle was less than a mile from the Microsoft campus. Whenever I went to an after-hours tech get-together or happy hour, everyone who attended worked at Google, Facebook, Amazon, Microsoft, or some other massive tech company. Everyone around me made tech wages and was on the cutting edge of their field. I really enjoyed living there. The people felt like my people; we were all tech-savvy, tech optimists, eager for work and building the latest of whatever we thought the world needed (or would make a lot of money). Politics aside, we shared a vision of technology and of the future that seemed filled with promise and potential.
A few months after I moved to Chattanooga, I was chatting with a young couple in the pew behind me at my church. I asked the gentleman where he worked, and he said he worked at Amazon. I lit up because I had several friends who worked at Amazon. He seemed confused at my eagerness and quickly changed the topic.
I didn’t realize until later that this was because we lived in very different worlds. In my world, a job at Amazon was a prestigious job. Amazon was infamous for a brutal working environment but rapid elevation and generous stock options. They have their 14 leadership principles that everyone knows and every new employee builds their first desk from a slab door, just like Jeff Bezos did when he founded the company. Everyone I knew who had been with Amazon for more than five years was very well off.
But in Chattanooga, Amazon is not a premier tech company that makes its employees millionaires. Here, <a href="https://www.cnet.com/tech/tech-industry/amazon-avoids-paying-warehouse-workers-for-long-waits-and-walks-practices-that-affect-thousands/">Amazon is a warehouse owned by a stringent, wealthy task master who gets sued regularly</a> for requiring unpaid wait times from their hourly employees. His Amazon job is not a prestigious job. It’s not going to make him generationally wealthy. It’s just a job. We know two different Amazons because we are in two different working cultures.
Despite moving to Chattanooga, I still mostly live in this tech culture. That’s why I was caught off guard by the raging debate around data centers. As a technologist, an optimist, and an AI enthusiast, I have long thought that the resentment against AI-centric infrastructure was more of a fringe position held largely by people who are instinctively anti-corporate or anti-technology. I assumed they would fail in their attempts to shoot down these very expensive, very lucrative infrastructure projects driven by the richest and most powerful companies in the world.
The last six months have convinced me otherwise. This week, Pennsylvania Governor <a href="https://www.pa.gov/governor/newsroom/2026-press-releases/governor-shapiro-signs-executive-order-on-data-center-developmen">Josh Shapiro signed an order</a> demanding the strictest rules on data centers in the country. New York Governor <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/14/nyregion/new-york-data-center-moratorium-hochul.html">Kathy Hochul ordered a statewide moratorium</a> on hyperscale data centers and <a href="https://arstechnica.com/ai/2026/08/texas-halts-data-center-connections-to-power-grid-amid-overwhelming-demand/">even Texas Governor Greg Abbott</a> has ordered a pause on new approvals pending an audit on what this will mean for the Texas electrical grid.
There have been dozens of other examples of state and local efforts to restrict construction, and these efforts are not following a reliable partisan pattern. If there is any pattern at all, it is that the entire vibe over the last 12 months has become substantially more negative against new data centers. According to polling from HeatMap, public support for data centers <a href="https://heatmap.news/daily/data-center-opposition-poll-collapse">has collapsed across the ideological spectrum</a>.
&nbsp;
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1165539" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/89a73c35-9de7-4804-bd77-8d1ab81c5397_1464x1020.jpg" alt="" width="1464" height="1020" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/89a73c35-9de7-4804-bd77-8d1ab81c5397_1464x1020.jpg 1464w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/89a73c35-9de7-4804-bd77-8d1ab81c5397_1464x1020-300x209.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/89a73c35-9de7-4804-bd77-8d1ab81c5397_1464x1020-827x576.jpg 827w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/89a73c35-9de7-4804-bd77-8d1ab81c5397_1464x1020-768x535.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1464px) 100vw, 1464px" /></div>
&nbsp;
Why is this? If you listened to the rhetoric from the people leading the anti-data center charge, you might think you know why they are anti-data-center. You would be wrong.
What They Say They Want
<a href="https://open.substack.com/users/109001275-cremieux?utm_source=mentions">Cremieux</a> <a href="https://substack.com/home/post/p-211797956">wrote up a well researched overview of the reasons people give for hating data centers</a>, why most of those reasons are false, and how learning the truth doesn’t seem to change people’s opinions. As for what to do about this, his conclusion was basically “do whatever it takes to placate the opposition and just build.”
I’m not sure that is going to work because I think the problems that opponents are citing aren’t really the thing that bothers them. Worries about water, energy, noise, aesthetics, and subsidies are not the root problem that people have with data centers.
The piece “<a href="https://jasmi.news/p/no-data-centers-in-my-backyard">No Data Centers In My Backyard</a>” from Jasmine Sun cuts much closer to the heart of the issue. Sun writes from Wisconsin and Michigan about the tension between local leaders, who see that data centers are a natural fit for land that is otherwise undevelopable, and local residents, who fear that these big companies are making empty promises, manipulating local politicians, and planning to roll over the local community.
A core part of Sun’s reporting is that these residents have been made promises in the past by big corporations. She mentions a Foxconn deal in Wisconsin where the company was offered $4 billion in tax incentives for a plant that would have created 13,000 jobs. A decade later, only 1,000 jobs materialized.
The biggest difference between that deal and these data centers is that there are no promises for permanent jobs with data centers. After construction is complete, even a hyper-scale data center can be run with 100-200 employees, which is <a href="https://www.lonestarlive.com/news/2024/06/how-much-do-buc-ees-employees-make-the-answer-may-surprise-you.html?outputType=amp">fewer employees than it takes to run a Buc-ee’s gas station</a>. In 2025, a look at the permit filings across 17 data center projects showed plans for <a href="https://poweredbywho.com/methodology/jobs">only 1,547 permanent operations employees</a>.
In the meantime, the tech companies that are building these data centers<a href="https://layoffhedge.com/industry/tech-layoffs-2026"> have fired 170,000 of their own employees in the last year</a> alone, claiming that these layoffs are due to AI. For computer science students ready to start their careers in this high-tech culture, the on-ramp to a lucrative career has been blocked off. The<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeltnietzel/2026/02/23/unemployment-and-underemployment-rates-among-recent-college-graduates/"> unemployment rates for new graduates in computer engineering and computer science</a> are higher than for graduates in art history.
While previous industrial construction projects promised thousands of jobs and economic revitalization, this time the industry that wants more data centers is plainly telling people that more data centers mean fewer jobs.
Techies vs Normies
I consider myself a part of the tech industry. I am excited about AI and what we are going to build. This is a moment of tremendous opportunity. But I have also seen a very dark cloud rolling over our labor market. Most of my friends from Microsoft have been laid off or taken the “early retirement” buyout option. People in the industry that I’ve known for 15 years are writing LinkedIn posts about how excited they are for the future, but they have an undertone of despair. It’s bad out there. It’s bad for 20-year tech veterans and for newly minted junior developers.
While all this is happening, I see fountains of money gushing out of AI startups based in San Francisco and New York City. There is a hyper-optimism in my AI tech circles, but the optimism is mostly about how good things are for us, the builders. To the extent that the tech culture believes things will get good for those outside our orbit (the normies), we seem to think that they will benefit from our grand benevolence and that they will be lucky to get it. We seem to view people outside our tech sphere not as participants in the future but as recipients of whatever good things we create for them.
I don’t want to pick on Cremieux here, but when you click to his post about trying to persuade the data center skeptics, the first thing you see is an AI company sponsor offering $300K for junior software engineers. All the positions are in-person in San Francisco. That is what things look like from inside the tech cultural bubble.
But when I look outside my tech bubble, I don’t see that energy or optimism. Much of tech culture is not open to everyone. It is an elitist culture that looks down on those who don’t share its values. One of the values they have is that you have to physically live in their bubble. You can make $300K as a junior engineer but not if you need to stay in Indiana so your spouse can be available to help your aging parents. You can raise millions for your AI startup but not if you live in the South or Midwest.
Venture capital is pouring billions into these companies. It isn’t because they have the best ideas or the best people. It is because they exist within the right culture, within the right cities. This isn’t a merit-based proposition. It’s a social club.
&nbsp;
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1165541" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/25f3ec84-54eb-4550-862d-f30aa3e95d51_1126x682.jpg" alt="" width="1126" height="682" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/25f3ec84-54eb-4550-862d-f30aa3e95d51_1126x682.jpg 1126w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/25f3ec84-54eb-4550-862d-f30aa3e95d51_1126x682-300x182.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/25f3ec84-54eb-4550-862d-f30aa3e95d51_1126x682-951x576.jpg 951w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/25f3ec84-54eb-4550-862d-f30aa3e95d51_1126x682-768x465.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1126px) 100vw, 1126px" /></div>
&nbsp;
A tech company will spend $10 billion building a data center outside of a Wisconsin town but they won’t sponsor a Little League team. They won’t support the local Girl Scouts. They won’t build a park. They want the land and space and they want to escape the burdensome regulations and insane anti-growth politics of California, but that doesn’t mean they actually like any of the people who live near their data centers. They don’t care if these outsiders find growth and success; they want them to get out of the way. And if paying enough taxes to reduce the overall tax burden of the local bumpkins is what placates them, fine. Whatever gets them to shut the hell up, leave us to our more important business, and accept their rightful place as the underlings of this particular arrangement. They don’t really have any place in our vision of the future.
This is starting to sound like a populist rant, but that’s not where it is coming from. I love working in tech. I love the people in tech (most of them). I love what is happening in AI, and I’m really excited to build with this new tool and to help others build. We are in the middle of the most exciting tech development of my lifetime (so far!) I want to share that excitement with friends and colleagues and especially with young people who are just graduating and coming into the world of tech. I love being part of a culture with this optimistic energy and eagerness to build the future. But I want this to be an open door. I want $300K junior developers in Atlanta and Nashville. If the AI promise is everything it says, then why are the jobs and money increasingly concentrated in a few culturally isolated tech hubs?
How Do We Fix This? Do We Even Know What We Are Trying To Fix?
Even assuming I’ve identified this cultural backlash as the real reason people oppose data centers, how would we fix this problem? I’m going to try to avoid the smarmy answer to this, which is “Go back in time and don’t make a decade worth of corporate and cultural mistakes that led to this problem.&#8221;
In my view, the core problem is the astonishing arrogance of people within the tech culture. Even in debating this issue, the overwhelming response from libertarian and tech-adjacent people seems to be dismissal and disdain. There is some outright anger against both people who oppose data centers and the politicians who are responding to this movement. There is a lot of this sentiment that “these idiots don’t know what is good for them,” along with a seemingly resilient insistence that data center opposition is just a successful Chinese psy-op. The “Chinese psy-op” position is a perfect distillation of this arrogance because it assumes that these people couldn’t possibly be thinking for themselves or using their own judgment; they must just be stupid people who are easily manipulated.
Of course, now I’m being a bit dismissive of my friends within tech culture. Many of them really do want to address the actual concerns that the data center opposition is raising. The problem is that very few of the data center opponents have articulated the cultural resentment I’ve brought forward here. It is reasonable for the pro-data-center people to become exasperated as they repeatedly ask:
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="aligncenter size-full wp-image-1165543" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/36a3a8b0-d4d3-4bda-bd78-ad506fbab6d4_459x195.gif" alt="" width="459" height="195" /></div>
And if we want to do a deep dive on introspection, we could argue that I’m being smug and arrogant in this very article towards the very people I say we need to understand because I’m elevating myself as the “normie-whisperer” while portraying myself as acting as “team tech” at the same time. Maybe I’m part of the problem that I’ve just identified.
At the end of the day, I genuinely do want the following things:
<ol class="ol1">
<li class="li3">More data centers to support the most tremendous innovative technology of my lifetime.</li>
<li class="li3">Everyone to feel like they are participants in and beneficiaries of this emerging world.</li>
</ol>
You shouldn’t have to live in San Francisco or New York City to feel like you’re a part of this revolution. I want the towns that build these data centers to feel like they are a part of this movement and not like they are a cheap and convenient place for Californians to build the things they need but are unable to build in their state because they have spent decades supporting a completely dysfunctional government that they inexplicably refuse to abandon. I want tech companies to say, “We want to build with you because we want you to be a part of this great thing,” not “We have to build with you because our native state is so screwed up that we can’t possibly build here despite having near-endless land and money.”
Flipping the script, there can’t be any form of compromise if the data center opposition can’t even tell us what changes they would accept in exchange for permission to build. If what they really want is to be treated with respect, they might not get that. Respect might simply not be on the table. If that’s the case, they will end up in a place where they don’t get the respect, but they also don’t get the fringe benefits of boosted tax revenues.
From a practical perspective, I don’t see that the anti-data-center team needs to compromise. They have overwhelming support at the moment. If we want more data centers (and I do), the question then shifts to “How do we change this so that people will accept more data centers?” I suspect the answer is something close to “We need to treat these communities with respect and make them feel like a part of our team in this endeavor.&#8221;
What I see instead is the tech community doubling down on disdain. This makes me feel crazy because, as a tech person, I place very high value on strategies that work. If my first tactic doesn’t work with my target customer, I can bitterly blame the customer while my company goes out of business, or I can change my tactics to something that finds more success.
To their credit, many in the tech community are trying to figure out what will work. To their detriment, most of these strategies assume that their opponents are stupid and that we can just deftly outmaneuver them with money and power and the fact that they are oh so much smarter than those flyover hicks. Which is exactly the attitude that makes negotiations pointless.
***
This is republished with permission from the author. The original can be found <a href="https://www.marginallycompelling.com/p/data-centers-are-a-culture-war">here</a>. Subscribe to Marginally Compelling <a href="https://www.marginallycompelling.com/">here</a>.
Matt Shapiro is a data visualization artist and software engineer and the creator of the Substack newsletter Marginally Compelling.

Demonstrators Against Data Centers On National Day Of Protest

How Data Centers Became The New Culture War Provocation

josh shapiro

opinion

tech industry layoff

There they were, crammed in the close quarters of the filled-to-capacity Capitol Rotunda to shield our aged political leaders from the cold outside, flanking the once-and-future president as he took the oath of office for a second time. The richest and most powerful people in the world rubbing shoulders awkwardly – there were Elon, Jeff, Tim, Sundar Pichai from Google and (ominously) Shou Zi Chew of TikTok shifting in uncomfortable folding chairs designed to put them on display. The most natural thing that happened was Mark Zuckerberg accidentally reminding the world that he’s straight.
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<div id="attachment_1165413" style="width: 1546px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><a href="https://nypost.com/2025/01/20/us-news/mark-zuckerberg-busted-staring-at-lauren-sanchezs-cleavage-at-trump-inauguration/"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-1165413" class="size-full wp-image-1165413" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/mark-zuckerberg-get-caught-peeping-97027211.jpg" alt="" width="1536" height="1194" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/mark-zuckerberg-get-caught-peeping-97027211.jpg 1536w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/mark-zuckerberg-get-caught-peeping-97027211-300x233.jpg 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/mark-zuckerberg-get-caught-peeping-97027211-741x576.jpg 741w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2026/08/mark-zuckerberg-get-caught-peeping-97027211-768x597.jpg 768w" sizes=" (max-width: 1536px) 100vw, 1536px" /></a>Credit: Fox</div>
They were there to give homage to the man who had beaten them, and who now they needed to woo back to their side. Big Tech did a terrible job navigating the Trump years, and they knew it. They let their woke control freak employees go wild after 2016, and were forced to debase themselves as having not done enough to stop Hillary’s collapse. Pronouns and politics became mandatory in an industry that had been all about whatever nerd could build the best company in their dorm room. The media pressure was enormous. Out of nowhere, they were deemed the new pontiffs of the Trumpian era: what their platforms decided was okay was an endorsement. They had an obligation to censor, to silence, to shadowban, to debank, and, above all, to fund dying newspapers. They suddenly had to throw a gigantic pile of money at race problems because a random drug addict died in Minnesota. They caved to the forces of censorship in the 2020 election and indoctrination during the Covid years, becoming synonymous with a leftist authoritarianism totally at odds with the rebellious hacker mentality that birthed their industry. They didn’t care about politics – but it cared about them. So they did what they had to do, or so they thought at the time. And they lost.
Now here they were, sitting and grinning, as just off stage their high-paid consultants and their NGO partners and their Aspen and Sun Valley and DAVOS friends were all losing their minds. But what else were they supposed to do? If the rule they followed brought them to this, of what use was the rule?
It was time to make amends. They would do the work of politicking; they would shake hands and smile and talk about working together. They would survive the return of the president they had tried and failed to ban. Because all this came just as the next stage of technological advancement, long burgeoning and anticipated, was about to skyrocket. And that would reorder not just our economy, but the world.
This moment was more significant for our politics than many grasped at the time. It represented a dramatic shift where, for the first time, Republicans were about to become the party of Big Tech. Where Silicon Valley had been a punching bag for conservatives for years, what with their climate change nattering and San Francisco values, they left California behind for the welcoming arms of pro-business red state leaders. The taxes were low, the regulations more forgiving, and their employees could finally afford a house. They were flush with consumers and data and cash after years of lockdown. And for the GOP’s influential investor class, the A.I. spark made these companies synonymous with skyrocketing market success. The sides had flipped.
Few states were more welcoming to this shift than Texas under Republican Governor Greg Abbott, which became a haven for Big Tech headquarters. The attitude from the state’s Republican leadership wasn’t just advocacy but cheerleading advancement and a Western agreement with moving fast and breaking things. That’s why it should serve as such a stunning warning to these same companies that it’s the same governor who promised to lead the country in A.I. who is warning them now that they’ve gone too far, too fast:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="Gov. Abbott on voter concerns: ‘People are not talking to me about Trump’" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/s0cz302gYek" width="822" height="462" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
<blockquote>
ABBOTT: One thing is the rapidity that these data centers are coming online, that people didn&#8217;t see coming. The other is the way that the data centers, they didn&#8217;t do their job to get the support of people in local communities. Gaining the support of people in local communities is essential.
Because they did not do that, that&#8217;s why I am now coming in as governor saying, listen, if you&#8217;re a data center and you want to operate in Texas, you have to first get the approval of those in local communities…
KARL: It was last year that you said that Texas was the epicenter of the A.I. industry. In hindsight, did Texas move too fast?
ABBOTT: It wasn&#8217;t Texas that was moving fast, it was these data centers.
KARL: But they needed approval from, you know, from the government.
ABBOTT: Well, so what data centers we&#8217;re doing, and this is the problem that we are facing here in Texas, but you mentioned what&#8217;s going on nationally. And that is, they pop up in places that nobody ever heard of before, until they started the construction. And so they had not been working in collaboration with the state, they&#8217;d not been in collaboration with local governments, and so they basically dug their own grave for the problem that&#8217;s been caused for them. And that&#8217;s why they got the backlash they deserve.
</blockquote>
“They got the backlash they deserve.” The frustration of Texas communities and voters is what’s driving Abbott’s shift, just as it is across the country for politicians who welcomed a tech boom without thinking about the attendant risks. It’s as if these companies thought that the A.I. race was something they could win with just top-down approval from Washington and the governors – not convincing local voters and communities they wouldn’t raise their costs or wreck their environment.
You can hear the lunacy of this hubris expressed by the leader of one tech company, which is clearly the next in the barrel. The backlash to Flock cameras is growing in parallel to the animosity toward data centers, at an astonishing rate considering how quickly the issue has taken hold. It’s easy to understand why when you hear Flock CEO Garrett Langley talk with obvious irritation about the intransigence of local voters who have the audacity to… go to a <a href="https://www.wsj.com/tech/flock-cameras-are-spreading-across-america-the-backlash-is-growing-just-as-fast-fff74ed2?mod=mhp">council meeting</a>.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Flock&#8217;s CEO mocks people showing up at council meetings, saying we should &#8220;trust that the system works.&#8221; Meanwhile, his &#8220;huge team whose entire job is going to city council meetings&#8221; went to &#8220;close to 10,000 city council meetings&#8221; just last year. <a href="https://t.co/5XbiFDvBqs">pic.twitter.com/5XbiFDvBqs</a>
— Have I Been Flocked? (@HIBFlocked) <a href="https://x.com/HIBFlocked/status/2092048985993167000?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">August 25, 2026</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.x.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
<blockquote>
What I’ve come to agree with is the notion of a horseshoe mentality, that it’s just a very very small number of people, incredibly small, that tend to be really loud.
I imagine you’ve never been to a city council meeting.
Interviewer: I never have.
And I imagine you never will, because generally, I hope you vote, you should vote, and then you trust that the system works, that the person you voted for as generally aligned views, and like they’re going to go do the hard work, because that’s what you elect them to do.
</blockquote>
The political problem Big Tech failed to realize still exists: the views of the electorate still matter. It’s not just about gladhanding with the guys at the top. In the wake of the past decade, the American people’s level of trust in these companies is practically nil. It doesn’t matter to the normal voter if we’re in an A.I. race with China. It doesn’t matter that these companies have promised to back off of politics (Elon and Larry Ellison excepted). It doesn’t matter that they stood in that Capitol Rotunda to be publicly shamed. They have no depth of faith among the American people who use their products because they have to, even through a mist of resentment and laziness. We know we said A.I. is going to take all your jobs, but wasn’t it enough to give to the Inauguration Committee? No, it is not.
For Big Tech, the problem is easier to solve: work and spend. They have to make the case for themselves instead of dismissing the valid concerns of Americans. But somewhere there’s always going to be a state and a community to take their money and make a deal, even with the political costs.
For Republicans, though, the potential problem goes deeper. They are unused to navigating a world where being pro-business isn’t necessarily good for their voters. And they may find out they became the party of Big Tech just as much of the country turned against it. Billionaires are fun to play with, until they aren&#8217;t. And then, you find out they can be a real drag.

The Inauguration Of Donald J. Trump As The 47th President

Did Republicans Embrace Big Tech Billionaires Just As America Turned Against Them?

big tech

flock cameras

Republican Texas Gov. Greg Abbott is downplaying fears that Democrats could flip the Lone Star State blue this year and, with it, seize control of the U.S. Senate.
In an interview with <a href="https://abcnews.com/Politics/week-transcript-8-23-26-texas-gov-greg/story?id=135865528">ABC News</a>, Jonathan Karl pressed the three-term governor on Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton’s fundraising woes and whether his political baggage could cost Republicans the must-win U.S. Senate race against Democrat James Talarico.
&#8220;So, I&#8217;ve heard from Republicans, Texas Republicans, who have real concerns about Ken Paxton, the nominee for Senate or for your party. They say he&#8217;s not working hard enough. He&#8217;s not raising money. He&#8217;s got too much baggage. Do you share some of those concerns?&#8221; Karl asked Abbott.
“Well, let&#8217;s put it in context where Ken Paxton is in his campaign, and that is he was in a three-month-long runoff that demanded capital, it demanded campaigning, demanded his attention, and so he&#8217;s just now catching up in the campaign process with Talarico,” Abbott said, adding, “Talarico got away with something, and that is with Ken Paxton campaigning against John Cornyn as opposed to Talarico.” 
The Senate GOP’s fundraising arms continue to withhold money from Paxton’s campaign after President Donald Trump led the effort to oust incumbent Republican Sen. John Cornyn. Since then, Talarico has <a href="https://www.texastribune.org/2026/08/20/texas-us-senate-race-donors-ken-paxton-james-talarico/">dominated</a> the airwaves while Paxton has struggled to raise money in one of the nation’s largest and most expensive states for statewide campaigns. The <a href="https://www.realclearpolling.com/polls/senate/general/2026/texas/talarico-vs-paxton">RealClearPolitics</a> polling average gives Talarico a narrow one-point advantage. 
“In that runoff, John Cornyn said he was the kiss of death for Republicans and for the Republican ticket in 2026, that he would be an albatross on the party. He said if he&#8217;s the nominee, we could well experience a massacre and the first Democrat elected statewide,&#8221; Karl pressed Abbott. 
The Texas governor, who is running for a fourth term, downplayed those concerns, arguing that elections “are about choices.”
“And when voters go to make a choice on November the 3rd, the contrast they will see between Ken Paxton and James Talarico is so extraordinary. That choice is going to be easy. And they&#8217;ll be voting for Ken Paxton, and they&#8217;ll be voting against James Talarico,” Abbott said.
Paxton holds his strongest advantage among white voters and men, while Talarico leads among most black and Hispanic voters, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ken-paxton-gets-some-much-needed-good-news-in-race-against-talarico?author=Jacob+Wheeler&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=19&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Ken+Paxton+Gets+Some+Much+Needed+Good+News+In+Race+Against+Talarico">according to one survey</a>. Talarico held just a one-point advantage among women after facing backlash over his <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/talarico-says-god-is-not-a-christian-in-unearthed-sermon?author=Jacob+Wheeler&amp;category=News&amp;elementPosition=5&amp;row=0&amp;rowType=Vertical+List&amp;title=Talarico+Says+%E2%80%98God+Is+Not+A+Christian%E2%80%99+In+Unearthed+Sermon">views</a> on Christianity, <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-james-talarico-says-he-loves-trans-children-in-unearthed-clip">“love” for transgender children</a>, and disdain for the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/the-audio-thats-blowing-a-hole-in-talaricos-christian-persona">American flag.</a> 
Top issues for Texas voters include the economy (30%), immigration (19%), threats to democracy (14%), and healthcare (13%), according to the Emerson College poll. Republican voters rank immigration as their top issue (32%), while Democrats (33%) and independents (31%) rate the economy as their top concern.
Those issues have not stopped either campaign from diving into hot-button cultural issues as both sides wage a fierce battle for Christian voters who will likely play a pivotal role in November. The Daily Wire earlier this week uncovered the Democrat hopeful calling God &#8216;not Christian&#8217; and comparing evangelism to forcing alcohol on young children.
&#8220;Christians and Muslims and Jews all worship the same God,&#8221; Talarico is caught saying in an <a href="https://x.com/LoneStar_PAC/status/2091533921968087104?s=20">unearthed video.</a>  &#8220;Muslims love Jesus&#8230; We are all branches on the same tree.&#8221;
The <a href="https://www.cookpolitical.com/senate/race/488686">Cook Political Report</a> ranks the race as a toss-up.

Texas Gov. Abbott Casts His Vote On First Day Of Early Voting For Primary Election Runoff

Greg Abbott Has A Message For Those Betting On Texas Turning Blue

john cornyn

ken paxton

texas senate race

Minnesota Democratic Attorney General Keith Ellison sued the state of Texas on Tuesday to force the extradition of a federal immigration agent charged with multiple crimes tied to the Trump administration&#8217;s deportation effort.
Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/ice-officer-charged-after-prosecutors-say-migrant-shooting-story-was-false" target="_blank" rel="noopener">charged</a> Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer Christian Castro in May with four felony counts of second-degree assault with a dangerous weapon and one misdemeanor count of falsely reporting a crime involving an attempted arrest in January. During a press conference on Tuesday, Ellison expressed concern over Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott&#8217;s alleged failure to extradite Castro.
He also cited a Texas law that says a person being held on an extradition warrant can only be held for up to 90 days, meaning Castro could soon be released from custody.
&#8220;A Hennepin County District Court judge found probable cause to believe that ICE agent Christian Castro committed felony-level assault when he allegedly fired his gun into a Minnesota home with people inside it and hit someone,&#8221; Ellison said in a statement on Tuesday. &#8220;A Hennepin County District Court judge also found probable cause to believe that Castro falsely reported a crime because he allegedly lied about the circumstances surrounding the shooting.&#8221;
&#8220;Now, Governor Abbott is trying to shield Castro from being held accountable for these serious charges by refusing to extradite him to Minnesota. Abbott&#8217;s refusal to extradite Castro is unconstitutional and violates federal law and Texas law. I will not stand for that, so I’m taking Abbott to court. Christian Castro will stand trial in Minnesota,&#8221; he added.
A spokesman for Abbott declined to comment on &#8220;pending extradition matters.&#8221;
During the January incident, Castro allegedly fired a gun at a home in north Minneapolis “with the intent to cause fear of immediate bodily harm or death to the four adults who were just inside the door,” Moriarty said during a May news conference. The bullet struck Venezuelan migrant Julio Sosa-Celis in the leg before traveling through a closet and lodging in the wall of a child’s bedroom.
Castro allegedly falsely told FBI agents that Sosa-Celis and another man assaulted him with a broom handle and a snow shovel before he fired his gun in &#8220;self-defense,&#8221; Ellison said during Tuesday&#8217;s news conference.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) initially claimed that Sosa-Celis tried to “evade arrest” before he “began to resist and violently assault” a federal officer. The federal agency alleged that two individuals came out of a nearby apartment and began attacking the officer “with a snow shovel and broom handle.”
Sosa-Celis then “got loose and began striking the officer with a shovel or broomstick,&#8221; DHS said at the time.
After “fearing for his life and safety,” the officer &#8220;fired a defensive shot&#8221; that hit Sosa-Celis in the leg, according to DHS. Sosa-Celis and two others “ran back into the apartment and barricaded themselves inside” before ICE arrested them.
In February, then-Acting ICE Director Todd Lyons announced a federal probe into the incident after video footage showed that “sworn testimony provided by two separate officers appears to have made untruthful statements.”
“Lying under oath is a serious federal offense,” Lyons said at the time.
“The men and women of ICE are entrusted with upholding the rule of law and are held to the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and ethical conduct,” he said. “Violations of this sacred sworn oath will not be tolerated. ICE remains fully committed to transparency, accountability, and the fair enforcement of our nation’s immigration laws.”
A federal judge later dismissed the charges against the two migrants after video footage of the incident emerged.
Authorities arrested Castro in Cameron County, Texas, on May 29, according to Ellison. Four days later, Democratic Minnesota Governor Tim Walz asked Republican Texas Governor Greg Abbott to extradite Castro to his state.
Abbott has yet to fulfill the request, Ellison said.
&#8220;Governor Abbott has withheld the warrant and held up Castro&#8217;s extradition for nearly three months,&#8221; Ellison said.
&#8220;He has no discretion to decline to do so. None. Yet, Castro is still not here to face justice,&#8221; he added.
Ellison said Walz&#8217;s office has &#8220;repeatedly&#8221; requested updates on the extradition request from Abbott&#8217;s office, which he said has yet to provide a response.
Moriarty sent a request on July 30 to Abbott for an update on the extradition request, but also didn&#8217;t receive a response, Ellison said. The Minnesota Attorney General said he also sent a letter on Thursday to Abbott &#8220;to inform him of his mandatory legal obligation to effectuate the return of Christian Castro to Minnesota to face justice.&#8221;
&#8220;Whether or not he needed the lesson, I cited all relevant constitutional and legal authorities that leave him no discretion in this matter. I informed him that if he did not sign the rendition warrant by the end of the day yesterday, I would sue to compel him to do so,&#8221; Ellison said.
&#8220;Governor Abbott did not respond. Christian Castro is still not here to face justice, therefore this morning my office filed suit asking the federal court in Texas to require Governor Abbott to sign the warrant and to block the Cameron County sheriff from releasing Castro until Minnesota law enforcement can arrive there to physically transport Castro here to face the charges laid against him,&#8221; he said.

Minnesota Governor Tim Walz Holds Press Conference

Minnesota AG Keith Ellison Sues To Force Texas To Extradite ICE Agent

Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport has scrapped a proposal to add Islamic foot-washing stations to two Terminal D restrooms, backing off Friday night after Texas Governor Greg Abbott called the plan illegal and opened a review of every state grant flowing to the airport.
&#8220;These ablution facilities appear designed to single out one subset of the population for special treatment based on religion. That is illegal,&#8221; Abbott <a href="https://gov.texas.gov/uploads/files/press/Airport_USDOT_Letter_FINAL.pdf">wrote</a> in a letter to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy. &#8220;Both airports are government-owned facilities. The federal and state constitutions prohibit governments from facilitating this sort of discrimination. Just as the government cannot favor the secular over the sacred, it also cannot favor one religious view over all others.&#8221;
In a separate <a href="https://gov.texas.gov/uploads/files/press/DFW_Airport_Authority_Letter_FINAL.pdf">letter</a> to DFW CEO Christopher McLaughlin, Abbott warned that organizations found to have developed or operated what he called exclusionary religious spaces could lose state grant funding and face further enforcement.
Abbott referred both DFW and Houston&#8217;s George Bush Intercontinental Airport (IAH) to the U.S. Department of Transportation for investigation and enforcement, asking the department and the Federal Aviation Administration to review religious facilities and accommodations at each. He also directed a review of all state grants to the entities operating the two airports for possible revocation and denial of future funding. Abbott&#8217;s office said IAH already operates an ablution facility with an adjoining prayer room.
&#8220;Texas will not allow illegal religious discrimination at taxpayer-funded facilities,&#8221; Abbott <a href="https://x.com/GregAbbott_TX/status/2088411718628049370">wrote</a> on X.
DFW <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/politics/dfw-airport-scraps-controversial-islamic-footwashing-station-plan-texas-gov-abbott-takes-aim">told</a> Fox News Digital on Friday that it had been weighing an internal proposal to add ablution stations on the pre-security side of Terminal D, its international terminal, and that it weighs operational benefits, customer service impacts, operational risks and costs before approving any project.
&#8220;While that evaluation was planned, the airport accelerated its review due to elevated public interest this week and has determined not to proceed with the project as it would not deliver the originally anticipated operational benefits,&#8221; the airport said.
The airport did not spell out what those benefits were. Defenders of the proposal, including conservative activist Ryan Fournier, had argued the low-level basins were a maintenance measure — travelers <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/one-of-americas-busiest-airports-is-about-to-get-islamic-foot-washing-stations-in-bathrooms">performing wudu</a> in standard countertop sinks soak restroom floors and damage counters. Wudu is the ritual washing Muslims perform before prayer, covering the hands, face, arms, head and feet.
DFW has offered an ablution station on the post-security side of Terminal D for years. Two were added to the terminal&#8217;s Interfaith Chapel during upgrades completed in 2019, alongside shoe storage, kneelers and expanded shelving for holy texts. Similar basins exist at other large U.S. hubs, including Chicago O&#8217;Hare.
The project was registered with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation on July 31. The filing listed it as privately funded, put the cost at $300,000 and said construction would be finished by year&#8217;s end.
DFW said those details reflected administrative errors by its outside design firm and stressed that the project had never received final approval. A spokesperson said the $300,000 was a preliminary high estimate and that the actual cost, had the project gone forward, would have run closer to $120,000. The Dallas Express <a href="https://dallasexpress.com/city/who-is-paying-dfw-foot-washing-filing-quietly-changes-after-300k-private-funding-report/">reported</a> Friday that the filing had since been revised to $115,000 and reclassified.
&#8220;That was an error and it should have indicated that airport funds would be used to pay for the work like all our projects,&#8221; the airport said, adding that it does not use taxpayer dollars for operations and instead relies on revenue from parking and concessions.

The Muslim Community In Mexico Celebrates Eid Al-Adha

DFW Airport Scraps Islamic Foot-Washing Stations After Governor Threatens Its Funding

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Dallas Fort Worth International Airport (DFW) is preparing to install Islamic foot washing stations inside bathrooms in one of its terminals.
Documents registered with the Texas Department of Licensing and Regulation on July 31 outlined a project that will add foot-washing stations to a men’s and women’s restroom on the concourse level in Terminal D, Fox News <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/travel/dallas-fort-worth-airport-install-islamic-foot-wash-stations-bathrooms">reported</a>. The work is privately funded and expected to cost around $300,000. Officials project completion by the end of the year.
The airport said it is installing the stations for maintenance and safety, since some travelers at DFW have been washing their feet in bathroom sinks, which leaves floors wet and slippery, causing hazardous conditions. The new low-level basins for foot washing are designed to prevent water from spilling onto the floor.
While anyone could use the stations, they will primarily accommodate Muslim travelers performing Wudu, the ritual ablution required before the five daily prayers. Foot washing is an obligatory part of the Muslim purification rite.
Other major American airports, including Chicago O’Hare, already have some foot washing stations. DFW also already has ablution stations adjacent to its interfaith chapel in Terminal D.
The foot washing stations are going into DFW bathrooms as major Islamic-focused projects in the Dallas area face intense pushback. Last year, Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott announced that the state had halted all construction on <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/texas-says-its-halted-construction-of-muslim-centered-epic-city-outside-dallas">EPIC City</a>, a massive planned development outside Dallas intended solely for thousands of Muslims. 
The community was designed so that Islamic principles would shape daily life, education, and commerce. Abbott stated that no construction is taking place and that Texas launched roughly half a dozen investigations into the project, including criminal inquiries. The U.S. Department of Justice also examined the matter.
Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) had previously urged the Justice Department to investigate, calling EPIC City a discriminatory religious settlement in which Islamic principles would govern not only daily life and education but also commerce. 
He warned that a planned community reserved for thousands of Muslims could violate the constitutional rights of Jewish and Christian Texans by excluding them from living there and discriminating against them inside the community. He pressed the department to determine whether non-Muslim residents would receive equal protection under the law.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton launched a parallel investigation into communications between the East Plano Islamic Center, the group behind the project, and officials in the nearby towns of Plano, Richardson, and Wylie. 
Paxton said any local official supporting or communicating with a development under investigation for potential violations of state law needed to have those exchanges reviewed. He pledged to hold accountable anyone found to have broken Texas law.

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One Of America’s Busiest Airports Is About To Get Islamic Foot Washing Stations In Bathrooms

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While he bills himself as a “border security” Democrat, James Talarico once accused Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott of “hunting people” and committing &#8220;atrocities&#8221; for securing the border. 
Talarico leveled the allegations at Abbott during a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz_OLVKJgVo">podcast appearance</a> in July 2023 as Texas officials put up barriers to deter illegal immigrants and close down President Joe Biden’s porous border. The Texas Democrat has attempted to sweep those views under the rug and now claims he wants to implement a “common sense” plan that would hire more Border Patrol officers. 
“I think Greg Abbott&#8217;s border stunts have now become atrocities. As you mentioned, the Houston Chronicle is reporting on released internal emails that show officers being ordered to push women and children back into the Rio Grande,” Talarico said on the “Texas in Focus” <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cz_OLVKJgVo">podcast</a>. “They&#8217;re reporting on razor traps that are designed to maim and drown human beings.”
He went on to level a wild accusation that Abbott was &#8220;hunting&#8221; illegal immigrants. 
“And that should trouble all of us, regardless of your political affiliation, regardless of where you fall on the political spectrum,” he said. “Greg Abbott is hunting people for his own political gain. And that&#8217;s the most cynical thing that I&#8217;ve seen in my time in Texas politics.”
The comment is the latest to resurface as Talarico attempts to rebrand himself as a moderate, as polls show a tight race with Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton. From the border to transgender procedures for kids, Talarico has distanced himself from his past positions as he tries to win in red Texas outside of his home turf of deep-blue Austin. 
Talarico&#8217;s accusations refer to discredited claims from an official who alleged that Texas troopers were directed to push illegal migrants into the Rio Grande to stop them from entering Texas. The DPS Office of Inspector General investigated the allegations and found no evidence that supervisors ordered troopers to push migrants into the river.
In recent weeks, Talarico <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0srbD2hn2vM">claims</a> to have critiqued the “chaos” caused by Biden’s border policy and said he was a “border security” Democrat. That flies in the face of other comments made during the &#8220;Texas in Focus&#8221; podcast when he said he wanted the Biden administration to go after Abbott for moving to secure the border through water barriers and razor wire while hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants were released en masse into the United States. 
“I hope Joe Biden will do the right thing and act on behalf of everyone in the state and around the country who&#8217;s horrified at what they&#8217;re seeing on our southern border,” he said. “So I think Joe Biden, his administration, federal lawmakers have a moral responsibility to step in and prevent these human rights abuses that are happening in our name.”
Those comments came as nearly 100,000 illegal migrants were detained attempting to cross the southern border in June 2023. Biden&#8217;s border officials ended up cutting portions of the razor wire, and his Justice Department sued Texas over barriers placed in the water to deter illegal immigration. 
Over the years, Talarico <a href="https://x.com/jamestalarico/status/1149785576469618689">promoted</a> guidance aimed at helping illegal immigrants avoid detention, called for the southern border to have a “welcome mat” out front, and <a href="https://x.com/jamestalarico/status/2017709067469193583">accused</a> Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) of “terrorizing” the United States. 
In the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0srbD2hn2vM">same podcast</a> where he pitched himself as a “border security” Democrat, Talarico said that he opposed “gender reassignment surgeries for minors.” Just three years before, Talarico voted against a bill banning transgender surgeries on kids. 
American Principles Project President Terry Schilling <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/james-talarico-wants-to-rebrand-as-a-moderate-but-we-have-the-receipts">previously told</a> The Daily Wire that Talarico was hiding his leftist beliefs to convey a more moderate image to conservative Texas voters. 
“He’s a trans Texan, and people should see right through it,” he said. “He does not have your best interest at heart.”

Texas Senate Candidate James Talarico Campaigns Along The Texas Border

Texas Dem James Talarico Said Securing Border Was An ‘Atrocity’

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