DSA v Data Centers

Gabriel from Portland DSA joins Class to discuss the complex political and class struggles around unpopular hyperscaled data center construction in Oregon, and how the moratorium campaign influenced the State House primaries happening now, where a DSA candidate, Tammy Carpenter, is competing against the Democratic establishment and tech capitalists.

Read about the OR data center struggle in PDX DSA’s blog here. The two Jacobin articles mentioned in the episode include Holly Buck's “Democratic Governance of AI is the Real Solution" and Aaron Regunberg's “Stop the AI Build-out, Start the Fight." 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:10

Hi comrades, and welcome to CLASS, the podcast of Democratic Socialists of America's National Political Education Committee, or NPEC. My name is Michaela, and I'm the current chair of NPEC and a member of North New Jersey DSA. In this episode, I'm talking with Gabe from Portland DSA on local data center moratoria and the potential contradictions and struggles that arise in the fight to preserve communities and advance a socialist, worker-centered political agenda. In the near future, we'll be keeping up on this topic with other comrades as this is an area of continuing development and debate. So consider this a part one with more to come. Before we dive in, a reminder that CLASS is available on all major podcast platforms. Please consider becoming a DSA member by following the link in the podcast description. You can also send us a message about the episode and sign up for Red Letter and Peck's Monthly Newsletter using the provided links. Another quick note: over the course of the next few months and through the summer, CLASS will be releasing episodes more intermittently than our usual once-a-week schedule. So don't forget to subscribe so you can catch them. There's a digital version or section of how people experience socialism now. But also to suggest there's a set of open questions in our political orientation towards tech and the digital or online realm that need to be explored. In that episode, we touched on social media and the idea of making our own digital tools as a step towards political independence. And now, several weeks later, it seems like everyone is talking almost exclusively about AI and data centers, and what, if anything, socialists should fight for in the short and long terms. Some chapters are going all in on local campaigns to delay data center construction in their areas. Some people are debating the effectiveness of boycotts or these kinds of moratorium campaigns and advocating for democratization instead, but still others in the labor movement are warning that demonizing data center construction is a betrayal to union workers who are advantaged by the current building boom. It's a live debate, and one that whether you believe that AI is inevitable or not, or to what degree, implies that socialists ought to think about this as a powerful industrial infrastructure and intervene not just ethically or on the basis of individual preference, but with a principled political analysis and an eye towards something more than just stopping them. So here we have Gabe, a member of Portland DSA, a nurses union representative, and a member of Bread and Roses Caucus to talk about the campaign his chapter is working on. Gabe, welcome to class.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

Hey, great to be here, Michaela.

SPEAKER_02 2:58

All right, thank you so much for coming on. Um, we always start with the same question for everyone who's new on the podcast. Um, how and why did you become a socialist? And how and why did you join DSA?

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Sure. Um I grew up here in Portland uh in a labor family. Uh my father was a longtime uh rank and file activist in the teachers' unions here. Uh and you know, I think that just gave me a baseline for you know what it means to be a member of the working class, um, but very much in the confines of capitalism. Um I think graduating high school, you know, 2009, during the Great Recession, those contradictions of capitalism uh were really clear to me. Uh, and over time, uh, it led me to socialism. And I'm a member of DSA because uh it is uh the best chance we have as a working class to uh fight for a socialist future.

SPEAKER_02 3:54

So you came to socialism through the labor movement. So you obviously be very sensitive and attentive to these questions about whether the data center boom is actually something that um needs to be kind of put into the category of labor rights in this global way. And we'll get to talking about that because right now your chapter is running a campaign or helping to run a campaign in connection with your socialists in office um cadre candidates and um elected officials to uh put a moratorium on uh the local data center. Um I can speak just interestingly enough, my brother is a builder, um, non-union uh at the moment, but he was uh in a union shop to build data centers in Oregon, not in your area, but like uh sort of eastern Oregon area. And um he was, it was like the most steady work he'd ever had. Um so I'm also really interested to talk about this because it seems to be something that is um kind of another layer on top of this. And you and I both know that uh we can't just kind of shunt off like worker interest off from these kind of like more political ethical questions that people are really seizing upon right now. Um, so let's just start with talking about your campaign. Um, how did your chapter get involved in this uh area of this arena of uh data center politics and what has it been like for y'all?

SPEAKER_01 5:27

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, first important point to call out is that we're certainly not the origin by any means of resistance to uh data center build-outs here in Oregon. Um, you know, last several years, like in many places in the country, uh, the sort of hyperscaler firms, Google, Amazon, et cetera, have been working with regional and national data center developers to build these massive data centers, as you mentioned in eastern Oregon, uh, certainly, and now increasingly in the western suburbs of Portland in the Hillsboro area. And so even from the beginning, there was uh a real grassroots resistance that reflected, you know, different interests, right? This is not something that was incubated in DSA, reflects the thinking only of socialists, right? Um, these are folks who are upset about the ecological impact, upset about the uh degradation of uh the agrarian environment where they live. They're upset about uh the sort of promise of these amazing jobs that that don't tend to be sustainable or materialize. Um, and they're upset about the political corruption, right? There's a ton of money flowing into Oregon. Um and I think like a lot of Western states, there is frankly a bipartisan culture that's resistant to outside capital. Um, at least uh that's how people feel. So we just oriented to that, and it's become a big issue in these uh upcoming elections.

SPEAKER_02 7:03

When you say bipartisan, what you mean is that there's a kind of um libertarian tradition in the Pacific Northwest, where I used to live, um, that is not leftist, right? It's kind of more um you mentioned agrarianism, but it's also about kind of like land, and um, there's a conservation aspect to it that's also about very much about private ownership and the sort of don't tread on me gun culture. Um very, very prevalent in in Oregon. Um, but then also it's a hotbed of um the opposite in many ways. Um, you know, Portland, I used to live in Seattle. It's the left there is has always been um extremely kind of like um direct action-oriented. And so this is an interesting one because a lot of these data center uh kinds of fights are happening within like city councils and that kind of thing. So maybe you can talk a little bit about what the tactics have been like so far and like kind of what the buildup has looked like. And in particular, if you could speak to the ways that your um um local electeds, especially DSA electeds, have been involved. And maybe some I know that there's also been some backlash recently. So just kind of take us through the journey that uh you and uh Portland DSA and anyone else who you think um has kind of come up in this, uh has taken through this.

SPEAKER_01 8:24

Yeah, absolutely. Um, so I mean, I think you know, folks can imagine that there's sort of a broad nonprofit, you know, milie here that's grounded in either the environmental movement or sort of the land use movement. Um, and you know, they have been uh producing some of the technical opposition, right? Um the governor has uh an advisory uh council now. That was sort of her orientation to this surprise pushback on the data centers, uh, Governor Tina Kotek. Uh and uh so the sort of nonprofit groups have been, you know, supplying the research, the data, et cetera, which is huge, right? That's not work that DSA is necessarily doing. Um, what I think has been missing and what we try and embody is um uh a political economy, right? Like who are the big corporations that are spending money to support uh politicians? And in the metro area, we're talking about a fight within their Democratic Party, right? Almost exclusively. Um, and how is that money influencing policy? Um, we've had this incredible opportunity with this May primary for these nonpartisan statehouse seats in Oregon, uh, where we have already endorsed an incredible, you know, cadre candidate, Democratic Socialist, uh Tammy Carpenter, uh, running for State House in Beaverton, one of those western suburbs of Portland. Uh and, you know, she took an early position, right? She was hearing on the doors people were anxious about this. It didn't align with her vision of a society controlled, you know, by the working class, not by the ruling class. Uh, and uh, and so it was very natural for us to really drive this wedge issue, seeing that within that Democratic Party, right, there are these insurgent, upstart, um, Democratic Socialist candidates, uh, and then there's the establishment, right? Which to this point has been all in on uh on the data center piece because they're already in relationship with the chambers of commerce, Google, Amazon, obviously Intel, laid the groundwork, right? Um yeah, so uh I think tactics-wise, right, which was a you know, I appreciate the question. Um, a big part has been calling for moratoria, right? Um, but I think bringing in that sort of democratic socialist difference, right? This is not just lobbying, right, in the offices of the state house or you know, going to the advisory committee with the presentations. Uh, it's been bringing in the mass action piece, right? So there's a statewide petition that was launched by uh Eugene, DSA endorsed candidate for State House, uh Chi Fireside. Uh, and it's been a real rallying point to demonstrate that sort of mass pushback.

SPEAKER_02 11:18

So uh there's a petition currently happening, and then there's also this primary that you said, I think that it starts next week.

SPEAKER_01 11:26

Ballots are ballots are out now. Ballots are out now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:29

So what what is the relationship of that to Tammy's candidacy? Like, I mean, you said that she's going out on the doors, so she's part of the campaign. Your chapter and also Eugene is backing her, but then what who is she running against? And is there like a kind of fight there that can be also further seized upon and sort of scaffolded?

SPEAKER_01 11:49

Absolutely. Um, so like I said, right, this has all been happening in the background of the Democratic Party establishment for a long time, the sort of groundwork for these this data center build-out. And so our work has been really to um do some political education for the masses, right? Um there's it's certainly not the case that you can open up campaign finance for um for Tammy's opponent, uh Ashley Hartmeyer Prigg, and find, for example, a ton of data center companies that are giving her money, right? That's not what you'll find. What you'll find instead, right, are political action committees, uh business lobbies, right, and money from other establishment Democratic Party incumbents, right, who are themselves funded by uh groups you do know, like Google, like Amazon, right, like Intel. Um and so you can see that there's money flowing into this race, right? Um obviously it's not just because of the opposition to data centers, right? Um Tammy Carpenter is a huge champion for um universal health plan in Oregon, um, huge champion for um the quality education model, so proper funding of public schools, um big support for workers on strike. Um and those are all interests, right, opposed by the sort of political economy of data centers, right? Big business, et cetera. Um so that's really started to loom large. I'll share this, just came out today. Um, one of our um corporate-funded alternative uh weekly magazines, the Willamette Week, which has certainly not been a friend of uh working class politics. Uh they went ahead and endorsed Tammy Carpenter today, which was a bit of a surprise, though I think you know, you look at 40,000 doors knocked for Tammy Carpenter's campaign in a statehouse district, the data center issue looming really large in the public consciousness between these candidates. Um, we think that uh the Will Ammet Week saw the writing on the wall uh in endorsing uh a challenger to the Democratic Party establishment running as an open socialist.

SPEAKER_02 14:02

That's so interesting because what you're saying about the uh sort of like indirect, you know, channeling of money into someone's uh candidacy in order to kind of like, you know, create uh an ally in the data centers. It reminds me of a couple of years ago, um the congressional races were defined in some places by opposition to or support of crypto, but it wasn't being put out like that, right? And and that kind of funding model has been something that a lot of um sort of like tech billionaires and Silicon Valley venture capitalists have been um really capitalizing on, pun intended, um, you know, um over the last few years, because they've realized too that the kinds of things that they want to um bring about, obviously we're talking here about an industry model, but one that they also want to integrate into people's lives without consent. It's not a consumer model. What it is is a sort of like social transformative model. I'm an educator. So AI, of course, has a very special place in hell in my body. And I'm not gonna tell you what part that because of the fact that um I'm seeing all kinds of effects, and it's not just my irritation at the use of it for cheating, it's also about the way in which it is actively um causing um, let's just say serious issues with people's capacity to learn, to retain information, to do um the things that I think all socialists should think are about being able to develop human capacity, right? Um, so to me, this has like a very high ethical tenor. Um, but the way that you just put it together too shows that this is this is about the political economy of this being part of a whole package of capitalist kind of advancement, right? It's about being able to keep taxes low. It's about being able to um, you know, uh ensure that the health insurance industry and, you know, sort of like the healthcare conglomerates are still doing well. Um, in some ways, it's the ways that the capitalist class, the ruling class, expresses its solidarity is through this kind of campaigning, right? And um also about, you know, trying to support centrist Democrats or, you know, what we would probably call right wingers that are just called Democrats in office and saying this is the sensible solution. Um, I am curious though, you know, you said this this weekly paper um has has endorsed uh your candidate, which is like, you know, nice surprise, you know, you'll take it, right? But then there's also been attacks on on the the campaign, right? Like you've been um, you know, there's been lively opposition. So maybe you can talk to uh talk about some of the ways that that's expressed itself and like kind of what your your campaign has done to either fight back or whether you've had to.

SPEAKER_01 17:03

Sure, absolutely. So I think, you know, in relationship to our endorsed candidate for State House, Tammy Carpenter, um, you know, she has suffered attacks from the establishment. Um, one of the incumbent Democratic State House members, uh, Lisa Reynolds, uh, who represents one of the wealthier parts of town in southwest Portland, um, she penned a letter to the editor, op-ed, um, you know, attacking Tammy and endorsing her opponent, right? The sort of incumbent favorite. Uh, and it was interesting. It is rare uh in sort of genteel Democratic Party politics in Oregon for an incumbent to attack a hopeful for an open seat, right? And so I think that's worth emphasizing, right? There is not an interest for the Democratic Party here and for their backers in the corporate world to allow any kind of insurgent, left-wing, principled uh uh socialist in office, right? Uh, even in a situation where it's a safe seat, right? Right, blue no matter who, right, does not apply sort of classic scenario here. Um, and it's also worth, I think, thinking more about why it's so urgent a task for the political establishment here. Um, you mentioned, you know, as an educator, the impact of AI, which is of course, you know, required uh uh infrastructure related to these data centers and vice versa. Um, I know that uh there is a firm here called Sightline, uh, which makes drone equipment for the Israeli army. And they are based here in Portland and they rely on AI for their targeting. Um they put a really scary video out on their website um that was a flyover of uh of downtown Portland.

SPEAKER_02 19:01

Wow was it like super detailed and you can see people and stuff?

SPEAKER_01 19:05

Yeah, I mean it's you know, it's it's hard not to imagine uh a camera of that clarity flying over Gaza, right, during the genocide uh right now. And and so I think as much as this fight is about data centers, right, and the impact they have domestically, right, the political economy, of course, knows no borders, right? This is an internationalist fight uh against the the impacts of American empire. Um, and that's happening in Portland, right? That's not relegated to you know Raytheon Acres in Washington, DC, right? That's happening here.

SPEAKER_02 19:45

Yeah, no, that's a that's a really great point. And of course, um, so much of this has been focused on these bigger, more flashy uh companies like Palantir, owned by Peter Thiel, who is a very like, you know, open, we'll call him a public intellectual to be kind, but a public something, right? Like, and who's been very like in support of Trump and everything. But there are also all these little firms dotted all over Silicon Valley, reaching up into Portland, reaching up into Seattle, that also are involved in this, right? It's a it's a whole like interwoven industry that it's it's it's just kind of it's it can be overwhelming to think about. And and this is also, you know, where this debate comes in, right? What's like what are what is the right tactic when we're talking about things so local, like stopping a data center being built in your, you know, your county or something, right? Like that, like either doing like a uh a one-year moratorium. Some places have done one-year moratorium, some places are trying to change the law altogether, right? Like um and and ban them. Um, but there have been a couple of articles that have come out in Jacobin. Um, one by a woman named Holly Buck, uh, who argues that essentially this is just um going to result in more inequality, offshoring uh these kinds of buildings, or this this kind of like generation of uh power, data, whatever, um, to other places, and therefore not internationalist because you're just, you know, kind of shunting it off elsewhere. Um, a kind of she she describes it as NIMBYism, but like in this data center kind of way, uh, NIMBYism not in my backyard. And then today another article came up that is saying, no, these moratorium is act are actually the start of democratic governance, um, because Buck argues we need to regulate this democratically. We're this moratoria is not gonna work. He says, no, this is the beginning of the fight, right? This is how we we start doing this. I'm interested when you say the democratic socialist difference, you could be talking about a number of things, but one of them is about mass action, right? It's not about localism. In the strict sense, but the local is often where you begin, right? So you've you you mentioned political education, but I'm kind of wondering like, what's your thought and your political analysis of this? Um the sort of contradictions inherent here, you know, when we're talking about something like stopping the data center in your community, that's what everyone goes in on, but then they're just going to build it in the community next door, the, you know, the state next door, um, or the country next door, or what have you. Um, what do you feel is is kind of where you stand or like the purchase you feel that argument has. Let's talk. Yeah, what what's your what's your thought?

SPEAKER_01 22:37

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think first it's important to recognize that we have to contend with real contradictions, right? It's not simply a matter of saying, data center bad, data center out of my community, right? Uh, because we know that, you know, the politics of capital that that transcends state and it transcends states, as in countries, right? Um, we live in a transnational uh capital world, right? Even though as humans we only live in one place at a time. Um, so that that's attention, right? Um, I think it's worth also being really straightforward and saying that um, you know, this is a uh sort of a pyramid of firms, right? And in Oregon, the companies that do the actual build-out, right, are often uh union represented construction firms, right? That um that are being sought out, right? Obviously, union labor is gonna provide a higher uh quality of labor, right? Uh and there's also a value that's you know progressive Portland, right? That we want union labor. Um, so I don't think that anyone who's dealing seriously with the contradictions of the data center movement can look anyone in the eye who's a member of a building trades union and say, um, you have an obligation not to work, not to get your bag. I mean, that's ridiculous, right? Um, who who amongst us, right, can can really make that claim. I think what's more interesting and useful is to think about what is it about our society and about the political economy here, right, where those are the stable good jobs, right? For you know, union tradespeople or non-union tradespeople, even. And, you know, there's a lot of history there. You can go back to the end of the dominant industry in Oregon, which was of course timber, right? And the sort of build-out of the public sector after that time created two groups of really good jobs, right? Direct public sector jobs, and then money that went to public-private partnership, right? And the blossoming of a sort of domestic union construction industry. Um, but uh you also have to look around, right? You know, roads in terrible condition here, right? The the high school I went to in Portland, right, is is decades and decades old, falling apart, ceiling tiles falling off, right? Asbestos, right? The water fountains don't work. There is a lot of work to do, but the political economy is saying, let's spend public money in the form of tax breaks in this case, for the benefit of private interest building these data centers. And let's continue to neglect, right, the the needs that society actually has that would really build out um good jobs. And I have to say this sort of in conclusion on this point, right? Um, there there is political consciousness within the building trades unions here, right? They realize the contradiction. Um, you know, they're not they're they're gonna give us a hard time when the local electricians union published a warning to their members, you know, careful of DSA. They said actually something funny. They said, we agree with them on a lot of things, which I thought was a wonderful admission to put to have to put in writing, but but they were clear, right? DSA opposes these data centers, you know, consult with us before you get involved. And and I get it, that's not offensive to me, right? Um, but I think it also reflects a fairly narrow vision of the work that needs to be done to benefit society. And that requires reckoning with the political economy.

SPEAKER_02 26:19

Yeah, and I think the the sort of blindsidedness I think a lot of people were taken by, right? It's like the data centers have been, it seems they've just sort of sprung up from nowhere, right? It's like it's a it's a boom, right? It's an industry boom. And the point you just made, which is that we could actually have steady, good paying work that's about protecting the public infrastructure we both already do have, and that could be for the benefit of society. Some people say these data centers are for the benefit of society. They are, you know, um, about potentially making this stuff available to everyone, you know. Um, I'm I'm maybe being a little bit obviously devil's advocate here, considering what I just said about how I feel about data centers. But this idea that, like, no, these the these are going to be part of the public infrastructure, right? That this is inevitable. This is um uh like any technological boom. Some people compare it to the internet, but you could even say it's it's like trains or like something else.

SPEAKER_01 27:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 27:29

Well, we know about that too. Um very controversial uh choice there. But but nonetheless, like, you know, what would you say to someone who's like, okay, look, like we understand that right now it's terrifying everyone because it seems so sudden, but this is just technological progress. And this is something that we as socialists need to take advantage of and reclaim or like figure out how we're gonna relate to it, right? Relate to it politically, relate to it both morally in the sense of our own, you know, sort of political agency, how we like put that into the world, but also collectively, right? Like how we wrap ourselves around this. I've talked to some people who've said, uh, you know, this is the cat's out of the bag. You cannot, you cannot uh, you know, get rid of this. So we have to, we have to relate to it. Then those who just say, well, personally boycotting it or or um, you know, preferring not to use it, that's just putting your head in the sand. So, you know, you need to get with the program. And then those who have like more of a nuanced view are like, like I said, you uh we need to be strategic in our relationship with this because it's it's unstoppable. Um, I'm not gonna say what I really think right now. I want to know what you think, and then we can we can talk about it.

SPEAKER_01 28:48

That's a that's a great, great, good framing. So, right, I mean, you know, you can be very upset as I am about what's happening, but it's happening, right? And there's some sobriety in just recognizing the sort of march of technological development, right? But why is that happening? Um, I think that's really where we have to locate some of the conversation, right? I think again, you you referenced sort of the historical development of technology under capitalism, right? The impetus for technological development often has to do with labor saving, right? Reducing the cost of labor, which is capital's largest expense for generating profit. Uh, and you know, I think whether you're talking about AI's use in education, right, which is not just about sort of labor saving on an FTE basis, but also about privatization of public education, right? The ultimate labor savings for the capitalist class, right? Not having to fund public ed. Also really big in healthcare, right? Where AI is sort of furthering and speeding the alienation that patients experience with the people who take care of them, right? You have the the remote nurse, the the sort of AI provider, right? Um those things are happening, they're not prospective, right? And so if that is a world that is not uh suitable, right, for human flourishing, the question is what do we do? And I think the word moratoria, right, for these these moratoriums is is useful, right? Um well here's the thing, right? Whatever you want, I think there has to be recognition that for the for the working class, the people that are impacted disproportionately by AI and data centers, right? We have to have power. We have to have leverage. This is not a question of developing the perfect policy perspective, right? Um, this is a question of who gets to decide, right, how to split up the resources. And that's to build data centers, that's the resources that data centers produce, right? Um, you know, I think what we're seeing is that data centers are concentrating capital significantly, right? Um, I know in the in the the the article you referenced from Jacobin by Holly Buck, um there was some pitch about how no, no, data centers will allow us to to decarbonize, right? The implication being that we can um convert fossil fuel uh energy infrastructure to uh non-carbon forms of energy production, right? Um that's not what we're seeing, first of all.

SPEAKER_02 31:36

Also, why do you need data centers to do that? Well, you know, you know, it's like there's many choices.

SPEAKER_01 31:42

Anyway, sorry to interrupt, but no, no, I mean I mean it it has to be it has to be confronted on its face and also by you know its implication, right? Um data centers uh will increase significantly the demand for energy.

SPEAKER_00 31:56

Yep.

SPEAKER_01 31:56

Energy that is not being produced right now, right? And it is ludicrous uh to contend that building more data centers will provide some impetus or capital to fund uh non-carbon power generation. You know, I I live in Oregon, we're taking down dams because of their devastating impact to ecology and the rights of indigenous people, right? Uh, and there is simply not any source of energy production here that will uh feed the beast of data center development besides gas, right? And that's not my contention. Ask the investor-owned gas utility in Oregon, Northwest Natural. They put out a report last year that makes it very clear, and they are salivating, donating to establish democratic candidates and incumbents because they're here to capitalize. So, again, capital concentration from the data centers undermines the political power of the working class. It's not an opportunity.

SPEAKER_02 33:03

Yeah, I'm from Alaska and the um ping pong administrative kind of ball that they play with the um Anwar, the um Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, um, Mary Peltola, who was the one-term actually pretty good on labor, to be honest. Like she didn't break the railway strike. You know, she was one of eight uh Congresspeople. She eagerly sided with the Trump administration or the Biden administration to open up Anwar and to um have that be, you know, kind of like open season. Partly, you know, she explained why she's like, you know, good jobs, you know, benefit, you know, economic benefits, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But it was like there is this sense of um the idea that this is all zero sum or that there's some kind of like, oh, well, data centers are somehow the only answer to um, you know, generating clean energy. It's like, like you said, it's it's a wild thing to say, precisely because it's like, but we aren't using that energy. We don't need to use that energy. And this isn't even a degrowth kind of thing where you're saying we need to reduce the amount of energy we need, and which is a whole other debate, of course, regarding like what we can actually do, what will actually sustain life, all of those things. It's more like, and I really like the way you put it, you know, um, what is human, you know, like where does human flourishing fit in here? You know, what do we actually not just need to live, but need to be human and flourish? And I would have to say, now you're gonna find out what I really think. This, none of this, none of this is doing that, right? It's not doing it now. And it's and and there's been few arguments that I've found persuasive that it will do it in the future. Not only right now, AI is being used to kind of generate some of the nastiest stuff you've ever seen. And also, like I mentioned, it is not uh prompting um a lot of creative thought among, you know, amongst people. It's not, it's not providing time saving for anyone except for capital, right? Um and uh, you know, don't want to like completely derail our conversation to talk about all of our irritations with with all the various ways that we have to, you know, have our lives interrupted and like kind of deal with this AI thing. But I I do think that socialists do have an analysis that does marry the political economy of this with a broader conception of what it means to actually flourish socially and individually as people. Um, and you kind of talked about, you know, your irritation with the with the article. My own sense is that this person is kind of, yeah, like kind of saying, like, this is inevitable. And so therefore, we only have one choice, and it's not to stop anything. But I mean, that is to me, why would you tell people don't get in the way of this, don't get in the way of development? Because historically, collective action has stopped communities from being destroyed when people are actually able to get in um early enough. And in your view, do you think that it is early enough, at least in in your sort of assessment of the campaign? Um, or do you feel that it's um similar to what uh Aaron Rigenberg, uh, who also wrote for Jacobin, is kind of saying this is actually just a way for people to kind of begin the democratic process here. Um, that's not all he says, but I just trying to kind of give the landscape. But basically, my question to you is um, how do you feel about this? Uh, like the the prospect of success, uh, both for Tammy, of course, you know, good luck, Tammy, but um also just to actually really stop this and to chase them away or or or get them to whatever, disappear.

SPEAKER_01 36:59

Yeah, yeah. Bye-bye. So I think it's both. I think it's it's both, right? And and cause for optimism on both fronts. So I think first, um, you know, we're not, it's not too late, right? Uh, mostly because we're on this, you know, uh marble hurtling through the galaxy, slowly burning up, right? So the the urgency is there, and uh, you know, I think you can orient to that sort of fatalistically, um, either on the data center front or broadly. I I I think it's about inspiration. You know, here in Portland, uh in uh, you know, in the 70s, there was a grassroots revolt against uh a massive plan to build freeways, excuse me, build freeways uh throughout the metro area and here in Portland, right? And uh there were parts of that resistance that were articulating it in ecological perspectives, right? This is a build-out for the fossil fuel industry, right, etc. Um, but that grassroots movement was successful, right? And whenever I drive over the Markham Bridge, which crosses the Willamette River into downtown Portland, you drive by the spur that they built for the Mount Hood Freeway. And the Mount Hood Freeway was never constructed, right? Those revolts were successful. So um, in as much as I think we have an opportunity to have some inspiration from the past, right? Um, we also have a present context that I think is also a cause for optimism. I think this idea that this is an opportunity for the working class to build political power and political muscle that might even be expended beyond the data center issue, I think is also really exciting. There's, you know, a sort of, there's there's Tammy as a DSA leader, right, in on the West Side, but there's sort of a constellation of progressives that she's endorsed that are also united on this issue and have in common a left-wing sort of universal uh uh program, right? That um I think is exciting, right? You know, we have a ballot measure for uh universal health plan um likely next year. The same political incumbents that are for data centers are queasy or are in opposition to universal health plan. And the remedy is the same, right? An electoral program that is backed by mass action and large sections of the working class that are committed to that sort of socialist agenda.

SPEAKER_02 39:33

Yeah, it's it's always, I mean, I'm really glad we're talking about this now, too, because I would like to continue the conversation with others. Like hopefully we'll be able to talk to more people from other chapters who are working on this to talk specifically about what they've seen in their communities, um, the the kinds of maybe changes. You mentioned the um sort of uh the blessed, I won't say unholy, the blessed alliance of, you know, the sort of libertarian or like the don't tread on me right or the right leaning with uh kind of more radical, um, you know, socialist uh agenda. How have you seen uh changes happening like within the sort of um coalition that you've formed um amongst either individuals or like other groups? Like have you seen people kind of leaning more towards DSA? Have you seen people kind of start thinking about these things more holistically? Maybe you could just share if you have any.

SPEAKER_01 40:27

Yeah, so um, you know, as a as a chapter here in Portland, we have several of the suburban branches. And and one of the main sites of struggle against the data centers is of course out in Washington County on the west side, um, where our Washington County branch is located. Uh, and there has been a real public profile of uh of a gentleman named Jacob Roloff, who is on a reality show that's that was uh sort of nationally famous. Um and he, you know, is uh reality show, sorry. Uh no, I I I wish I knew. It's about it's about a family of of little people that that live on a farm in Kinsborough. Uh and I don't know the name, but um, but uh but at any rate, and and he's you know, he's leading this fight. He just joined DSA, cut a great video about why he joined DSA as the site of struggle, not just against data centers, but for a broader progressive and socialist agenda. Um, so yeah, I think I think whether you're, you know, the the sort of Democratic Party, right, upset that DSA is taking this position of leadership, or you're just right, a normal person that is impacted and afflicted by these data centers. Um, there is absolutely, I think, uh new juice uh for our DSA project, which is super exciting.

SPEAKER_02 41:46

Yeah, and I I really do think, I mean, I've been thinking about this a lot, not just because of my own vocation, but also in relation to political education and like kind of what the socialist role is in political education at a time when actual education is being threatened by capital in such a direct way, you know. It used to be kind of um gauche to actually come right out and say, yes, we think that AI should replace people and they, you know, kids shouldn't even read anymore, you know, or whatever. You you wouldn't you wouldn't actually say those kinds of things. But but basically you hear people saying that kind of thing now, you know, like that um, you know, soon books will, you know, go away or or what have you. Um, again, a little bit off the topic of this actual, you know, very rich discussion, but I do think that our role as political educators is also to help people um kind of talk to each other, figure out what it is they really think, figure out what kinds of questions to ask and say, you know, I'm not just annoyed that these people are building this ugly building near my house. This actually has to do with like a bigger mission of humanity, you know, like that that we call socialism, right? And socialism is the project of transforming society, getting rid of capitalism, right? Not just creating pockets of tall like tolerance or creating pockets of kind of like um, you know, oh, this is a nice neighborhood or what have you, but we really we have a big project. And have you found that people are thinking about that kind of thing when they're doing that local work and and they're maybe surprising themselves with the kinds of things they think now?

SPEAKER_01 43:33

Yeah, absolutely. You know, we have an existing campaign within Portland DSA that is uh a fight for public power, right? I mentioned these investor owned utilities that provide uh gas and electricity in the case of Portland General Electric to uh most of the people that that live here. Um Pacific Power is the other, the other bad guy in that trio. Um and so the public power. Campaign, right, which sort of predates our entry into the data center fight. Uh, the the dovetail is really clear, right? The the political power we have to build to win public power, right? To to sort of break the backs of these investor owned utilities. Um, that that is to be built, right? And the data center fight, I think, has been great opportunity to expose masses of people who may not have consciousness yet about public power, right? Or they think public power is a small town thing in Oregon, right? We have our, you know, people's districts, right, in in small parts of Oregon.

SPEAKER_02 44:35

Could you explain what that is? Sorry.

SPEAKER_01 44:37

Yeah, absolutely. So it's just a municipal, um, basically cooperative, right? So if you're in a small town in Oregon, right, you can't afford to build uh energy infrastructure. Um uh and of course, if individuals were trying to purchase that on the open market from an investor and utility, right? It'd be prohibitively expensive, right? So it's a cooperative, a purchasing cooperative, right? Um but but that's not the case in Portland, right? We have all investor owned power here. And so um I think you know, our eco-socialist working group being able to meet people where they are on the data center issue and say, yeah, wouldn't it be great if Northwest Natural Gas, if PGE didn't even exist, right? What a blow that would be to uh uh their support for data centers and to the data center project. So I think the connections are being made, which is very exciting.

SPEAKER_02 45:30

That is so cool. I mean, I I really do think that, and you know, debates will happen. This is unfolding very quickly, but I do think that the example of the Portland campaign and the way that your your chapter has also historically been able to kind of help people weave these things together and bring people in that way. It is it's kind of a natural in a lot of ways. People are so upset that this stuff's being shoved down their throats, right? It feels undemocratic on its face, regardless of the fact that it's happening through these elected officials. So the contradictions that are really important here are the ones about we elected you to protect us. We elected you to you know to fight for us. And all you're doing is um turning our communities over to these developers and investors, right? Um, I think for a lot of people, it's very clear that this is wrong. And then the socialist's mission is to try to help people um keep going, really, you know, like to keep on seeing these things in a non-conspiratorial kind of way, right? And to like, you know, sort of join with others in order to kind of make, yeah, to make public power happen in all in all aspects.

SPEAKER_01 46:42

Yeah. I mean, you you mentioned, if I can just jump in for a second, you you mentioned a couple of times quite accurately, right, the sort of threat of libertarian tradition, right, in Oregon. And it's real libertarianism. It's not, you know, libertarianism. Oh, I'm very aware. Except on election day when they're Republicans. Like these are often, you know, there's an absentiist tradition, et cetera, right? As you know. Um, there is, I think, an interesting situation here developing where uh like so many people, libertarian or not, right? There is a lot of alienation from electoral politics, right? Uh, and that gets often expressed in idiosyncratic ways, right? That's where you get some of the, as you mentioned, the conspiratorial thinking, right? You know, the sort of elite this and elite that, and it's like which big this, big that. Yeah, elite, what uh what elite are you talking about? Uh, but uh, but I think for DSA to be able to say, yes, this is the elite, right? And it's not conspiratorial, it's analytical, it's a material analysis. It is showing what people are seeing with their own eyes, I think is so compelling. Um, I spoke to one of our uh electoral working group leaders who've done an incredible job, right? Knocking doors for Tammy and other candidates. And, you know, he told me that he's just been floored at the doors. People want to talk about the data centers. And he said it's such a rich jumping-off point to talk about the broader political economy, right? And and empowerment, like voting for this person, volunteering for this person, right? It's not just about like, you know, fighting Trump and the Democratic Party. It's like those, you know, fighting Trump's good, right? But um, but that's not uh, I think a relevant political project, right? That's a that's like a broad political sort of idea. So that distinction I think is really meaningful to folks.

SPEAKER_02 48:38

Thanks. Thank you so much, Gabe, for for coming and talking to us. I think that's a good place to leave off. And I'm really excited uh to find out what happens with the election and everything. I mean, it's as as terrifying as it can be sometimes to kind of like face down these relentless just evils, you know, like you know, just it can also just be so great to talk to folks to find out like really like what we're really doing, you know, like it's not just like turning up at city council or or what have you. It's uh it is, like you said, a political project. And uh I'm really proud of it. I'm really proud to be in DSA at times like this when we are not just meeting people where they're at, but also um helping people find their political agency. I think that's one of the biggest uh things that we can do right now at a time when it does feel sometimes like this is so relentless, you know?

SPEAKER_01 49:37

Overwhelming, 100%.

SPEAKER_02 49:38

Yeah. Um, thank you so much, Gabe, again. And thanks to our production crew, Emma, Michael, and Tim, who put all this together. Class is a podcast of DSA's National Political Education Committee, or NPEC, which works to expand the knowledge of DSA members and non-members in the service of winning the struggle for socialism and democracy. You can find out more about NPEC by searching for us online or following us on social media, but the best way to find out what our committee's up to is by signing up for Red Letter, NPEC's monthly newsletter. And if you aren't already, you can become a DSA member by following the link in the podcast description. Okay, until next time, solidarity.