President Donald Trump on Monday warned Americans that they risk becoming "backwards and poor" unless they allow Big Tech companies to build artificial intelligence data centers in their communities. In a social media post , the president…
Page A4From§Eachthe early bird edition — 31 August 2026
Trump defends AI data centers, warns towns that reject them will end up 'backwards and poor'.
Let's be clear about what happened here, because the coverage has gotten a little breathless. The President stood behind the data center buildout, publicly, under the banner 'Let Data Reign,' and made an observation about the communities that decline to host these facilities. He said they'd end up backwards and poor. That is not a threat. That is, and I cannot stress this enough, a market observation, the same way a realtor might tell you a neighborhood without a grocery store is going to struggle. Did I just compare federal energy policy to a real estate listing? That's — actually, that tracks, let me keep going. The data centers in question require enormous amounts of electricity and water, and the communities asked to host them are, understandably, asking questions about what they get in return. The President's answer to that question was not a subsidy figure or a jobs number. It was a warning about what happens if they say no. That's a policy position, stated plainly, by the person who occupies the office that sets federal energy and infrastructure priorities. It is entirely within his rights to hold that position. Whether it is the same thing as an economic forecast is a separate question, one I'm not going to resolve for you today, except to note that a forecast doesn't usually come with an implied consequence attached to the choice of the person hearing it. A forecast says here's what the weather will probably do. This says here's what will happen to you if you don't let us build the thing we already decided to build. I want to walk that back — no, actually, that's exactly what was said, that's in the record, 'Let Data Reign' is the actual phrase the administration is using publicly, and 'backwards and poor' is the actual phrase attached to towns that decline. Those are two sides of the same coin, and I was going to call it encouragement, but encouragement doesn't usually need a downside attached. The administration stands behind the buildout. Communities are being told what standing against it costs them. That's the position. I'll leave it there before I talk myself into agreeing with the other side entirely.
“Nice little town you've got there, be a shame if it stayed poor. That's the pitch now, from the President, in public, and the guy at the end of the bar hears it exactly the way it's meant.”
“The President is simply stating an economic reality, communities that embrace innovation tend to prosper — this isn't a threat, it's a forecast, an entirely voluntary forecast that happens to come from the Oval Office.”
The receipts
Trump argued that data centers will make communities "successful and rich."
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front.