For decades, the Republican brand has been built on distrust of government. If the electorate thinks the government is corrupt and inept, the thinking goes, they will vote to limit its powers and return money and freedom to the people. In practice, of course, the primary beneficiaries of this were wealthy businessmen, who welcome the tax cuts and the deregulation.
The problem now is that populists from both the left and the right are opposed to Trump’s dream of data centers from sea to sea. How can the GOP leadership turn off the public’s cynicism just in this particular field? So far, by making backroom deals to avoid public scrutiny until the last possible moment and by running bait-and-switch campaign commercials about AI regulation, it seems.
In the long run, that will only make the problem worse. It also presents an opportunity for the Democrats, if they can figure out how to use it.