Last week, the unlikely duo of Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon both spoke before a Washington group demanding a stop to AI and its datacenters.<\/p>\n
Notably, both lambasted the corporate oligarchs behind AI.<\/p>\n
The most potent force in US politics<\/a> is anti-establishment fury at a system seen as rigged against average working people. AI has become Exhibit A.<\/p>\n Until recently, both parties largely avoided criticizing the wealthy corporate elites that funded their campaigns. In politics as in nature, one does not bite the hands that feed.<\/p>\n Trump Republicans have instead aimed populist fury at immigrants, LGBTQ+ people, Black and Latino people, \u201ccommunists\u201d, Muslims, so-called \u201cwoke\u201d leaders, \u201ccoastal elites\u201d, \u201cchildless cat ladies\u201d and other scapegoats.<\/p>\n Democrats \u2013 with the exceptions of Bernie Sanders, AOC and a few others \u2013 have also avoided criticizing wealthy corporate elites, aiming their populist fury at Trump.<\/p>\n This may be changing.<\/p>\n It\u2019s becoming obvious to much of the US that giant corporations have been raking it in while workers have been taking it on the chin.<\/p>\n As of mid-2026, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics<\/a>, the percentage of the total economy going to workers as wages had fallen to a record low of 52.9% (down from above 65% when tracking began in 1947) \u2013 leaving the rest to investors, business owners, and corporate profits.<\/p>\n AI is on the way to causing far more inequality \u2013 generating billions for its backers while reducing the number of jobs and real wages.<\/p>\n Trump and his regime, meanwhile, have exposed the greed, venality, cupidity and corruption of the US\u2019s wealthy corporate elites by allowing them to do anything they wish \u2013 including create energy-guzzling, water-depleting AI datacenters \u2013 as long as they kiss his assets by funding his Pac, paying for his ballroom and singing his praises.<\/p>\n Trump has thereby revealed the truth about corporate America that for years had been hidden behind corporate PR about \u201ccorporate social responsibility\u201d, corporate charity and \u201ctrickle-down\u201d economics: the captains of corporate America are willing to throw average working Americans under the bus to make billions more.<\/p>\n Corporate avarice under Trump has become so blatant and corporate America\u2019s contempt for the needs of average Americans so flagrant that most Americans are now catching on. In a recent NBC poll<\/a>, 54% of Americans agreed that \u201cwhen it comes to politics and society, nothing really matters because powerful people will always do whatever they want.\u201d<\/p>\n AI may well be the final tipping point.<\/p>\n Data centers are unpopular \u2013 about 70%<\/a> of the public opposes them. And Americans harbor deep suspicions of AI. More than 60%<\/a> believe AI could destroy humanity (this includes 60%<\/a> of Trump supporters).<\/p>\n Fears about AI are provoking larger concerns about wealthy corporate elites bribing politicians \u2013 not just to get generous subsidies for AI but also to reduce the corporate elite\u2019s tax bills, kill off unions, slash social safety nets, deregulate Wall Street, attain no-bid government contracts, receive exclusive licenses, open tax loopholes, get tariff exemptions, use public lands, and become even bigger monopolies.<\/p>\n Because of Trump, Americans are coming to view those wealthy corporate elites as more aligned with Republicans than with Democrats. According to last week\u2019s Times-Sienna poll<\/a>, when likely voters were asked which party the word \u201celitist\u201d describes, a remarkable 43% said Republicans while 33% said Democrats.<\/p>\n This is something of a return to how the US\u2019s two major political parties used to be seen. Ninety years ago, Democrats were assumed to be on the side of working people against wealthy corporate elites.<\/p>\n On the eve of his 1936 re-election, Franklin D Roosevelt told the American people they were fighting \u201cbusiness and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, war profiteering \u2026 We now know that government by organized money is just as dangerous as government organized by the mob.\u201d<\/p>\n Will Democrats seize the moment and embrace the new AI-fueled economic populism? Or will they continue to succumb to the siren songs of big money?<\/p>\n According to Politico<\/a>, some Democratic political consultants are quietly urging candidates in the toughest battleground races to stay mum on AI \u201cover fears that powerful and well-resourced pro-AI interest groups could spend money pummeling them in the final weeks of the midterms\u201d.<\/p>\n It\u2019s not just the future of the Democratic party that\u2019s at stake; it\u2019s the future of America.<\/p>\n Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public policy emeritus at the University of California, Berkeley. He is a Guardian US columnist and his newsletter is at robertreich.substack.com<\/a>. His new book, Coming Up Short: A Memoir of My America, is out now in the US<\/a> and in the UK<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Last week, the unlikely duo of Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon both spoke before a Washington group demanding…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":778895,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-778894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=778894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/778894\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/778895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=778894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=778894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=778894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}