Super PAC Guardrails Alliance will launch a digital ad campaign Wednesday seeking to tie Ohio Sen. Jon Husted (R)'s past support for data centers to campaign donations he received from tech executives like venture capitalist Marc Andreessen. The 30-second ad, first shared with The Hill, highlights Andreessen's past donations to Husted's…
Page F129From§Eachthe morning edition — 28 October 2026
Super PAC answers Marc Andreessen's donations to Husted with thirty seconds of digital advertising
The bill has a title, and the title does the work: to protect taxpayers from additional costs posed by AI-driven data centers. Handsome drafting. Husted of Ohio wrote it, House Democrats voted for it overwhelmingly, and on the 28th of September the Senate Democratic leader set about killing it, his own caucus not fully behind him. You are thinking the politics have gone sideways. The money has not moved an inch. Andreessen's donations to Husted's Senate run sit on the record; Husted's support for data centers sits on the record; and a campaign donation is not consideration — nothing is bargained for, nothing is owed, nothing binds. So what does a super PAC put against a venture portfolio? Wednesday it puts ... thirty seconds of digital advertising. Thirty seconds. Thirty. In Ohio a lifelong Republican leads the fight against the buildout, and candidates of both parties spend the midterms easing voter concerns. On the 11th of September the Interior Department had the Bureau of Land Management drawing up lists of public land "ripe for data center development." The offer, in a column of the 29th of September: "great job creators," good neighbours, a new high school football field. The buildout keeps the land. You keep the advertisement.
Midsummer, the kits hunt the lane. The floor, a man has not mended yet.
“A lifelong Republican is leading the fight against data centers in Ohio — that is how bad it has gotten out there. And the pitch to those towns is a high school football field, while Interior has land managers drawing up lists of public ground for the next one. Andreessen writes checks to Husted's Senate run; Ohio gets a thirty-second digital ad and the costs.”
“Husted's bill protects taxpayers — his bill, the Republican one, the one Schumer is trying to kill, so you tell me who is on which side here. Donations do not buy votes, that is not how any of this works, did I say that? That doesn't sound like me. These are great job creators. Football fields. Good neighbors.”
The receipts
In Ohio, many people are displeased with the state's rapid buildout of data centers. It's a hot issue in the midterms, as political candidates from both parties try to ease voter concerns.
The energy needs of the AI boom and the construction of massive data centers in states across the country have created a backlash from both Democratic and Republican voters. The battle against data centers is at the heart of a campaign in Tennessee: Democratic state Representative Justin J. Pearson is opposed to the Colossus data centers…
· Schumer, Dems at odds as leader aims to kill Ohio Republican's data center bill from the morgue, 28 Sep 2026
· Trump Administration Making Aggressive Push to Use Public Lands for AI Data Centers from the morgue, 11 Sep 2026
· Salena Zito explains how data centers are benefiting communities from the morgue, 29 Sep 2026
This page is a back-issue: the story as it ran, receipts as they were. The current edition is at the front. The byline is a pen name for a column drafted by a machine and checked by the editor: how this is made.