How to Fight Data Centers and Win with Abre' Conner | Ep 68

Across the country, everyday people are fighting some of the most powerful AI companies on earth — and winning. But the untold story of data center resistance is that it's not just tech-NIMBYism, but a civil rights and environmental justice fight led by Black and Brown communities. This week, Nora (flying solo while Marcus is out) sits down with Abre' Connor, Director of the Center for Environmental and Climate Justice at the NAACP, to talk about the fast-growing movement against AI data centers. They dig into why this fight is following a painfully familiar playbook of environmental racism, what it took to sue Elon Musk's xAI over unpermitted gas turbines in Southaven, Mississippi, and what Gary, Indiana's weeks-long power outage really tells us about who bears the cost of the AI boom. It's a conversation about what's possible when communities refuse to be told they're disposable — and build the power to prove it.

Mentioned in the episode:

Robert Reich Explainer on Data Centers | AOC presses EPA administrator on water and data centers | PBS Overview on Data Centers | US Data Center Moratorium Tracker | Trump: Communities that reject data centers will end up 'backwards and poor' | Data Centers could be the winning issue for democrats | NAACP | How the NAACP Is Stopping Dirty Data | Earthjustice | Gary Indiana power failures | east coast data center accused of violating federal law

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Crowded Out: The True Costs of Crowdfunding Healthcare | Readying to Rise

Music: No Tears for a Wolf · Ahamefule J. Oluo · Okanomodé. Used with permission.

Logo by Nikki Barron.

Transcripts are machine-generated and imperfect.