Artificial Intelligence is becoming a 2028 campaign issue
Artificial Intelligence is becoming a 2028 campaign issue
Publish Date: 2026-06-05 05:00:00
Source Domain: www.yahoo.com
A version of this article originally appeared in Quartz’s Washington newsletter. Sign up here to get the latest business and economic news and insights from Washington straight to your inbox.
The AI boom is scrambling the American political landscape. Potential Democratic and Republican candidates for the 2028 election are starting to stake their territory on a rapidly evolving technology.
Companies are pouring record sums of money into developing AI, as Americans grow wary that the technology will drive widespread job losses and reshape privacy rights and national security. It’s setting the stage for AI to become a major theme in the next presidential election.
“AI will force itself onto the political agenda in 2028,” Chris McGuire, an AI policy expert at the Council of Foreign Relations, said in a blog post. “When it does, the American people will expect policymakers to have serious answers ready.”
AI companies aren’t shy about flexing their election-year political muscle. This year’s midterms are awash in nearly $265 million in planned spending from super PACs with ties to Anthropic and OpenAI, a pair of the biggest AI companies. There’s also growing bipartisan recognition that voters’ angst about quick AI adoption without safeguards is becoming a flashpoint in national, state and local elections.
Rising electricity bills that voters blame on power-hungry data centers have caused some 2028 Democratic hopefuls to temper their enthusiasm for AI. Last week, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro released a plan that would obligate data centers to cover the cost of their own energy sources so residential ratepayers aren’t footing the bill.
In Pennsylvania, average household electricity rates jumped 14% last year, according to the Energy Information Administration. “That’s why I am putting clear guardrails in place to hold developers accountable to protect consumers, strengthen communities, and put Pennsylvanians first,” Shapiro said.
