Author: Ellen Schwartz

Ghosts in the Data Center Machine

A Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism (CCDS) Statement
(May 2026)

Climate change is a key challenge of our time, with the rapid rise of artificial intelligence (AI) and data centers casting this issue into sharp relief. AI and data centers simultaneously escalate ongoing oligopoly and the concentration of wealth.

According to one source, three corporate giants presently control about 58% of worldwide “hyperscale” capacity. Such magnitude of development is a major consideration in both environmental and socioeconomic impact. An announced merger of NextEra Energy and Dominion Energy would create the “world’s largest regulated electricity provider” for the purpose of serving Northern Virginia’s “Data Center Alley.”

A 40,000-acre data center approved in Utah is larger than Manhattan; behind this project is Canadian billionaire Kevin O’Leary. A proposed Nevada data center would siphon away electricity from 49,000 existing users in Los Angeles. Hundreds of data centers have been proposed, are under construction, or are already in operation across the US.

As in the 19th Century Industrial Revolution, artificial intelligence information processing and data management is of benefit to society as a whole. Simultaneously, substantial socioeconomic and environmental costs are produced. Ways must be explored and pursued to maximize the potential of AI and data centers while eliminating or minimizing their adverse effects. Large and justifiable public outpourings against data centers and the top-down fashion in which they continue to be imposed have been generated around the country. This growing opposition is deserving of active involvement and support.

CCDS endorses the “Artificial Intelligence Data Center Moratorium Act” legislation introduced by Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to impose a national hold on data center construction until concerns are better identified and addressed. Further legislation featuring anti-trust provisions must be enacted in concert with expanded public ownership.

CCDS supports the rights of localities to exercise democratic control, free of corporate or top-down political interference, over the nature and purposes served by AI and data centers. For example, an Indiana coalition of 27 civic organizations have called for a statewide
moratorium. Besides control over data center placement, size, and aesthetics, there must be strict limits on public surveillance, cryptocurrency, military applications and other anti-social uses. More than just involved with construction, operations, and maintenance, union labor must be at the decision-making table.

Resources for organizing and mobilizing campaigns around AI and date center issues can readily be found online. CCDS urges members and supporters to get involved, if not already. All matters of far-ranging consequence to the future of the planet and the public interest must be subject to popular will and democratic control.

 

THE COMMITTEES OF CORRESPONDENCE FOR DEMOCRACY AND SOCIALISM (CCDS) RESPECTS MILITARY PERSONNEL WHO CHALLENGE ILLEGAL WARS

Antiwar marches holding banner - we won't fight another rich man's war

Members of CCDS and many other progressives have spent our adult lives opposing United States foreign policy, economic sanctions, covert operations, and wars in Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and elsewhere. Often, we have critiqued military spending, offering a vision of a different kind of society.

Despite the historic stances of the peace movement against war and interventions, it has tried not to disrespect the personnel who for many reasons have made the military a career. The peace movement has recognized that military personnel have been trained to act in a professional manner. Despite many media narratives the peace movement did not wish to disrespect those who fought in Vietnam but rather were critics of the policy but not those who, often against their will, carried out the policy.

Also, CCDS, as part of the peace movement, knows that United States military behavior is circumscribed by numerous traditions, documents, international institutions, the US Constitution, and the values of religious institutions.

Today, in reference to the wars against the peoples of Iran and others in the Middle East, it is clear that many, if not all, documents and traditions, indicate that US war against Iran and support for Israel’s war are acts of international illegality. Also, US actions violate the US Constitution and most importantly the humane values embedded in the US culture.

Therefore, we in CCDS wish to express our respect for US military personnel who are raising objections to US aggression and violations of international law in Iran. CCDS respects those military personnel who criticize and/or refuse orders by politicians to continue and escalate the war on the Iranian people.

CCDS also stands in support of efforts to improve international institutions such as the United Nations system, international law, and the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights.

NO TO WAR!

END GENOCIDE!

BUILD A PEACEFUL WORLD!

Refuse ICE Employment and Resist ICE Operations

“ICE has a budget bigger than most militaries around the world. It has increased its spending on weapons by 700% since last year. Trump is building his own personal military to terrorize American cities, trample on civil rights, and intimidate his opponents.” —Robert Reich

Under the direction of President Donald Trump US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), often involving masked and brutal agents, has launched a veritable spree of immigration arrests, raids, detentions, and deportations. Asserting only those with serious criminal records would be subject to apprehension is yet another Trump lie.

Those swept up are mostly hardworking and taxpaying immigrants with no or extremely minor criminal records, many of whose documentation paperwork is in order, who are diligently following legal requirements, and may have permanent residency status in the US. In some cases, those who have been swept up include US citizens, and in one instance a US citizen, Minneapolis resident Renee Nicole Good, has been murdered.

Families have been subjected to wanton and cruel separations. Persons have been held indefinitely, some incommunicado, at locations far from their normal places of residence. Some have been transported to dismal conditions in foreign settings that are not their countries of origin.

Also patently obvious is that this is a politically-driven and racist policy. Urban areas that did not vote for Trump have specifically been targeted for raids and enforcement. Those stopped, subjected to questioning, and detained are typically brown or black. In a diverse, multiethnic and supposedly open society such as the US purports to be, such policy is simply unacceptable.

CCDS urges any and all who encounter calls or advertisements to work for ICE refuse such job offers. Join us in resisting the siren song of racist and anti-democratic employment. Organize and join efforts to restrain and stop ICE, to disrupt their brutal Gestapo-type tactics, challenge them everywhere, support legal action against them, bring the message to all demonstrations and protests to abolish ICE.

We demand humane treatment and well-being for everyone in the US and subject to its jurisdiction. As the labor movement has taught us — “an injury to one is an injury to all!”

See links for further background.

On ICE employment:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/ice-law-enforcement-recruitment-online-ads-b2892877.html

On ICE brutality:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/shocking-images-reveal-the-brutality-of-ice-raids-tearing-through-us-communities/ar-AA1PCI7R

[CCDS – January 2026]