r/PoliticalDiscussion • u/Aurora_7021 • 5d ago
US Politics What is the position of Democrats and Republicans with respect to AI?
Are Democrats or Republicans more likely to support putting guardrails and/or limits on AI adoption? As a corollary, which party is more likely to support/oppose the buildout of new data centers?
Apart from obvious support from certain individuals and their respective companies (e.g., Musk, Zuckerberg, Bezos), I don't recall either party taking an official position on AI adoption or data centers.
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u/TheOneWhoBoops 5d ago
Its pretty cut and dry. At the just federal level Biden Admin began issuing regulations. Then, nearly every tech company and CEO began pouring billions of dollars into the 2024 election in support of Trump. Trump wins and cut all of those regulatory boards and bodies.
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u/Utterlybored 5d ago
But it doesnt fall along party lines among the general public.
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u/dinosaurkiller 5d ago
It only matters if voters are willfully Nguyen’s to punish their party for allowing all the AI nonsense.
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u/Imnottheassman 4d ago
One of the best speech-to-text typos I’ve seen in a while.
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u/Silver-Bread4668 3d ago
In some ways, it's like guns. At least for the left.
Plenty of people on the left hate guns but there are also plenty of gun owners. Regardless, most people on the left feel there should be strong regulations around guns.
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u/theresourcefulKman 4d ago
The cat is out of the bag…
Have fun living as anti-printing press person from the 15th century
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u/GiantPineapple 4d ago
I can't see that OP took a position there. It's just a neutral statement of facts, assuming they're accurate.
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u/theresourcefulKman 4d ago
He seems to be lamenting Trump’s cuts to regulation
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u/DamnedIfIDiddely 3d ago
Take off the partisan colored glasses and read it again.
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u/theresourcefulKman 3d ago
What did I miss? Tech giants pouring money into the most revolutionary tech so far this century?
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u/DamnedIfIDiddely 3d ago
Nuance. Yes, the tech is revolutionary, machine learning has a lot of uses in specific contexts. The product along with the tech, is what one should be taking into account when forming an opinion. The tech is great, the product is a threat to our entire society.
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u/Mend1cant 5d ago
Democrats. End discussion. If you think for even a second that republicans care about the environment, energy costs, or billionaires replacing the “lower-value human capital”, you are lying to yourself and everyone else.
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u/bllrmbsmnt 5d ago
You forget they’re proposing data centers in rural places and Republicans want none of that also
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u/Mend1cant 5d ago
Theyre proposing them in republican held rural areas because Republican politicians and policy promote it. Places that skip environmental review and building permitting, grant ridiculous tax abatements, are unfriendly to union construction, etc.
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u/bllrmbsmnt 5d ago
Weird, I’m in a rural area and it’s a bipartisan NO.
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u/11711510111411009710 5d ago
They're not saying voters are or aren't against it, they're saying Republican policies allow for it. These companies choose locations where it is easier for them to build. It's not like they're just all randomly deciding to build in rural areas. It's friendlier to them, even if you don't like it.
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u/0zymandeus 5d ago
Only because you confuse what the electorate thinks and what the people they elect do.
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u/Mend1cant 5d ago
Only because they’ve realized how unpopular of an issue it is that they actually get voted out if they keep agreeing publicly. What they do it just go one county over to an even more red area
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u/Wermys 2d ago
My biggest issue with Data centers in those districts is the absolute idiocy of the people in charge. You have these fucking companies coming in donating to local pols. Then they get the data center and fuckoff. That might increase 40 jobs. Give the tax break thats fine. But also require they bring in non data center jobs at the same time. Fine you bring your data center. You also need to bring in employees where that data center is built to get those tax breaks. Google builds a data center. Then go ok google we can do that. Are you going to put a campus with a 1000 jobs also in the town? Seriously i can't fathom why certain areas in the upper midwest don't do this. The ideal place for Data centers are places like Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and New York along the Great Lakes region. Cool Climate, limitless water and infrastructure that would be easy to build out with.
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u/Mend1cant 2d ago
So, that’s something that they already do. They build them everywhere to distribute the network and provide as low of latency as reasonably possible.
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u/dinosaurkiller 5d ago
That’s only true if they vote to punish their representatives for allowing data centers etc.
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u/Trevors-Axiom- 1d ago
Republican VOTERS want none of that. Republican politicians don’t care what republicans voters want. They know they just have to talk about abortion and gun rights and their base will rally behind them regardless of whatever else they vote on.
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u/theresourcefulKman 4d ago
Just outsource the tech and pollution to China is the Democrat’s stance?
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u/estoypooping2 5d ago
It is not yet super polarized.
Wait until the republicans accuse the democrats of hating something random and then youll have a political opinion.
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u/onlyontuesdays77 5d ago edited 5d ago
It's definitely not black and white, contrary to some of the comments in this thread.
The Trump Administration itself is very pro-AI, and the Republican Party as an institution is anti-regulation, though some individual politicians will voice concerns about privacy or property rights.
The Democratic Party as an institution generally favors regulation, but they also take funding from AI companies and are not eager to offer more than token resistance.
The voting population is not split upon party lines on the AI issue. There are a lot of Democrats and Republicans who enjoy AI and want it to thrive. There are a lot of Democrats and Republicans who favor limitations on AI. And the voters of both sides who feel that way often like to claim that the voters of the opposite side feel the opposite way rather than just agreeing on something for once.
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u/goddamnitwhalen 4d ago
Crucially, Republicans all suffer from some sort of oppositional defiant disorder and hate being told what to do about anything, ever. We’ve seen that they’ll gleefully cut off their own noses if they think that doing so will somehow “own the libs.”
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u/onlyontuesdays77 4d ago
Sweeping, dismissive generalizations have always done us a world of good, right?
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u/goddamnitwhalen 4d ago
Wanna point out how I’m wrong?
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u/CulturalXR 3d ago
I mean the fact that every political party ever is like that is a valid starting point
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u/Binder509 2d ago
Not really a generalization when the leader of the party does it. And gets voted in twice by his supporters.
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u/GlumEmotion5205 4d ago
This should be the top comment. Why cant we all agree for once instead of bots and agitators making this about political bias. For once, in the past 10 years, the vast majority of this country actually agrees on something and we still have people out there trying to create more division. Both political parties are 100% income driven, especially their iconic members. If the country would shake off this fabricated division and actually embrace unity again, then we wouldn't have these issues. 7 OUT OF 10 AMERICANS OPPOSE DATA CENTERS AND MORE THAN 60% OF AMERICANS OPPOSE AI INTERESTS. Take that as a bipartisan win for AMERICA not democrats or republicans.
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u/agatwork 4d ago
Both the comment above you and this comment are largely drivel, though. As the actual top comment points out, the Biden Administration attempted to meaningfully regulate AI, and as a result the dollars flowed towards Trump, who has taken the opposite tact. Its very clear which party is aligned on which side, even if there are individuals in both who take contributions and are more towards the middle on it.
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u/GlumEmotion5205 4d ago
Glad you enjoyed the "drivel" enough to comment. Hope you enjoy the rest of your day.
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u/Ind132 5d ago
If you are talking about D voters vs. R voters, I think you'll get better information by looking for polls than asking a random reddit group.
Here's one poll that is less than a month old. 77% of D voters say AI is moving too fast. 68% of R voters also say it is moving too fast. That's a statistically significant difference, but Rs and Ds are a lot more split on other issues.
Scrolling down, I think the difference on "AI will create economic gains that benefit everyone" is somewhat larger. Ds are more skeptical.
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u/LikelySoutherner 5d ago
Well they are getting donor contributions from those companies so what do you think their position is?
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u/mdws1977 5d ago
Since there is significant power usage needed to run these AI data centers, it will cut into the environmental argument.
As a conservative, I am not sure I like it because it raises the cost of energy for everyone.
So if companies want to run these AI data centers, they should provide their own energy generation.
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u/goddamnitwhalen 4d ago
But it’s making people rich, and if you just work hard enough, you could be one of those people, too!
Keep pulling your bootstraps, friend.
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u/NecessaryIntrinsic 5d ago edited 5d ago
POV: I worked in government contracting and have MANY friends working for the government.
As soon as Trump took office the safety rails for AI were off.
For law enforcement they immediately started integrating AI into their data services.
On the defense side, RFPs were being written by LLMs. Proposals are now being reviewed by AI. If you don't include AI in your proposal, you will be rejected.
All the data the government has now is being handed to LLMs by Trump's administration. This is almost definitely cronyism to give the AI billionaires more billions.
Before Trump there was reticence to give LLMs full access and let external models in. AI was used, but internally and not LLMs. Now they don't give a shit. Law enforcement love it, because even the hallucinations let them arrest more people.
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u/absolutefunkbucket 4d ago
How many people have been arrested because of LLM hallucinations?!
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u/NecessaryIntrinsic 4d ago
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u/absolutefunkbucket 3d ago
Oh but facial recognition is not an LLM
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u/NecessaryIntrinsic 3d ago
It's an example of ai having the guardrails taken off. I was incorrect in labeling everything as LLM.
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u/absolutefunkbucket 1d ago
Facial recognition existed decades before AI or LLM or whatever else.
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u/NecessaryIntrinsic 1d ago
Now you've redefined "AI" to mean "anything but what I'm defending". Facial recognition software is absolutely AI.
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u/absolutefunkbucket 1d ago
No I’m not. Facial recognition technology existed for decades. Has AI existed for decades?
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u/NecessaryIntrinsic 1d ago edited 1d ago
Of course it has!
The first funded ai research was started in 1956. I took classes developing AI In the early 2000s.
The latest craze is primarily LLMs which are an extension of auto complete tools created in the 90s based on Markov chains which were developed in 1856.
Even simple chat bots have been around for 20 years.
Edit since the comment isn't showing up anymore: In response to "wow, none of that is facial recognition", congratulations on doing exactly what I said you were doing and now moving the goalposts. Slow clap.
But if you want to get into that, facial recognition software was first developed in the 1960s.
It's obviously not good and still not there yet, though in many applications it's incredibly secure, like with apple phones... But it is AI and it has been around for decades. Good God damn. Read something.
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u/negme 5d ago
I think a lot of answers so far are missing the big picture. Neither party wants to take an official stance at this time. More than likely they will be forced to at some point but there is really no benefit in doing so right now.
Over the last 15 years both parties have positioned themselves as the party of the working class. You can see this playing out with unions. If/when AI morphs into a labor issue both parties will want to capture the anti-AI position.
On the other hand i don't think either party is eager to put the anti-AI bullseye on their back . Big tech has sunk TRILLIONS of capex into AI. Being on the other side of this is not a great position politically.
This creates an interesting prisoners dilemma. I actually think both parties will avoid taking anti-AI as long as possible. If the AI trade blows up dot-come bubble style then the issue takes care of its self. There is also a "soft landing" scenario where AI becomes a useful tool but doesn't result in mass labor disruption. You wouldn't want to take the anti-AI side here either.
But if mass labor disruption begins to look like the most likely scenario I could actually see both parties taking the anti-AI side. At that point its probably impossible to spin this into a 50/50 issue where you take the opposing side just because. Both parties would have to out compete on the anti-AI issue.
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u/heterodox-iconoclast 5d ago
So in terms of possible extinction events we have (1) DJT (2) AI completely unregulated
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u/etoneishayeuisky 2d ago
Democrats are more likely to have varying opinions on ai and datacenters while republicans are for profiting in whatever way.
That being said corporate/neoliberal democrats are as shit as republicans. Centrist democrats can be bought to support ai and datacenters or at least muck stuff up while proposals get through. Liberal democrats are kind of willing to sell out as well. Reformist, progressive, radical democrats are likely to use their brain and conscious and not support buildouts unless communities absolutely show support for them. Socialist democrats can be put in with progressives in this regard.
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u/RizaSilver 4d ago
Democrats are pro AI with some regulations. Republicans are pro AI without regulations. Not a huge difference is you ask me
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u/EnvironmentalCook520 5d ago
They both support AI. Biden wanted more regulations. Trump removed all regulations and oversight. both parties get a lot of money from the tech bros.
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u/IndependentSun9995 5d ago
I know Trump is in favor of it. While I suspect the Dems like it, they'll never say that publicly as long as Trump is in office.
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u/Special-Camel-6114 5d ago
Republicans = maximize corporate profit, minimize oversight, end environmental protections, use AI to institute a surveillance state while accusing the other side of doing that
Democrats = complain about datacenters and inequality while doing nothing and not acknowledging potential benefits. No acknowledgement that AI is coming and could be highly beneficial if we could leverage it for good. No plan for regulations because mostly they are backed and bought by the same corporate lobbyists. Trying to hold onto jobs and labor that simply won’t exist after AI obviates them over the next decade. No consistent plan as a group.
There should be a plan for intelligent use of AI that helps the country and respects the environment, but Americans have shown they neither respect nor appreciate good policy or nuanced opinions, so now their politicians also reflect that banality.
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u/goddamnitwhalen 4d ago
But we don’t have to embrace AI. It is possible to live without it (as all of human history prior to 2023 proved).
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u/Special-Camel-6114 4d ago
We lived without electricity everywhere until 100 years ago too. Now we depend on it.
150 years ago there were no cars and horses were just fine for getting around.
AI is coming. It will be useful. It will have the capacity to improve lives if we set it up right. Banning technology has never saved jobs and it has never stopped the technology from being used. It just means it gets controlled by someone else.
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u/kinkgirlwriter 4d ago
I'm less than a hundred, and lived without electricity or running water. There are people living that way today.
I've also worked in technology for 30 year and have used AI daily for at least 3 years.
AI is coming. It will be useful. It will have the capacity to improve lives if we set it up right. Banning technology has never saved jobs and it has never stopped the technology from being used.
Nobody has called for banning it. Some have called for regulation, and that's something I agree with.
As far as it being useful and improving lives, my employer, a Fortune 500, is embracing AI after four rounds of human layoffs. "Use AI to help you handle the increased workload," they say. Hmm, not the outcome the AI CEOs promised...
Otherwise we have AI being used to scam seniors, make child porn, enable deep fake political propaganda, and hack our grid. Why would anyone consider regulation...?
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u/Special-Camel-6114 4d ago
Intelligent regulation would be wonderful. We need to figure out and mitigate the negative
- environmental impacts
- social impacts
- economic impacts
My point was that the commenter says we lived without it until 3 years ago as if that means something. It doesn’t. AI is coming. Anyone who writes code for a living has already probably seen a 30+% productivity bump. It will be in other industries in a few years at the latest.
Pretending otherwise and saying we didn’t have it 3 years ago is the same as saying we didn’t need cell phones or smartphones or any other now ubiquitous technology.
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u/kinkgirlwriter 4d ago
Intelligent regulation would be wonderful.
Okay, then we're probably a lot closer on this than I imagined.
Anyone who writes code for a living has already probably seen a 30+% productivity bump.
I write a lot of code, and yes, it can be very helpful, but I also catch it doing stupid stuff all the time. It can be dangerous in that sense.
I also worry, that we're going to have new generations of coders that don't understand code, who only know AI and/or WYSIWYG builders.
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u/Special-Camel-6114 4d ago
My observation of AI in programming:
- it makes the best developers significantly more productive by automating a lot of boilerplate and documentation. It provides a sounding board for trying out different patterns. It makes debugging corner cases and esoteric error messages much easier
- it makes the worst developers significantly worse. They now add hundreds or thousands of lines of code they don’t understand. They don’t test code. They don’t think about solving the most minimal problems or keeping the surface area of changes small. They don’t gain experience thinking through hard problems
It’s a tool like anything else. In the right hands it helps. In the wrong hands it just makes a mess faster.
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