Six decades ago, in a near-nuclear disaster erased from public memory, a U.S. Air Force B-52D Stratofortress—carrying two thermonuclear bombs—was torn apart six miles above the Appalachian Mountains. The aircraft’s vertical stabilizer snapped off mid-flight, sending the bomber into an uncontrollable dive before it slammed into Big Savage Mountain in Western Maryland. The crash marked one of the closest nuclear near-misses on U.S. soil during the Cold War.

On January 13, 1964, a B-52D Stratofortress took off from Westover Air Force Base in Massachusetts en route to Turner Air Force Base in Georgia as part of a Strategic Air Command mission called “Operation Chrome Dome.” On board were five crew members and two thermonuclear bombs.

A heavily redacted USAF report on the mid-air accident of the nuclear-laden B-52D specified that a bulkhead structural failure occurred during severe turbulence that caused the vertical fin to separate. 

As the bomber broke up in mid-air, the pilot, Major Thomas McCormick, and co-pilot Captain Parker Peedin ejected and survived. However, three other crew members perished:

• Major Robert Townley (died in the crash)

• Tech Sgt. Melvin Wooten (died from injuries and exposure)

• Major Robert Payne (died from exposure after ejecting)

The crash drew national attention and mobilized hundreds of local volunteers for search and rescue efforts despite dangerous blizzard conditions across the Big Savage Mountain.

In 2014, Politico interviewed Gerald Beachy of the Grantsville Community Museum, which amassed a collection of crash memorabilia and wreckage from the bomber, who said it took USAF salvage operations several days to recover the thermonuclear bombs from the remote crash site.

The incident in the remote mountains of Western Maryland has been largely erased from public memory. It occurred at the height of the Cold War—just two years after the Cuban Missile Crisis. This wasn’t merely an air crash; it stands as one of the most serious nuclear weapons-related accidents on U.S. soil, even though the warheads were unarmed.

Reminders of the past are crucial as the nation braces for the 2030s—a decade in which the world is expected to fracture into a dangerous bipolar state, accelerating at an unprecedented pace.

Meanwhile, Europe is unleashing massive efforts to rebuild weapons stockpiles and scale up war readiness amid the ongoing war in Eastern Europe. Meanwhile, in the U.S., the Trump administration is accelerating plans to expand defense capabilities and bolster hemispheric defense. The arms and technology race with China is no longer in snail mode—it’s in full-blown hyperdrive, and with that comes many risks.

Authored by Gary Abernathy via The Empowerment Alliance,

It has long been acknowledged that the United States’ energy infrastructure isn’t particularly secure, a concern exacerbated by the lack of a central planning process for our nation’s piecemeal electric grid. Presidential administrations and Congress have been slow to address the problem, apparently daunted by the mere size and scope of the challenges the needed upgrades would present.

That needs to change now. The recent news that China apparently installed hidden “kill switches” in solar equipment sold to the U.S. was the latest in a long list of reasons to be concerned about our electricity infrastructure and the foolhardy rush to replace traditional energy sources with so-called “renewables” using technology that is often sourced from China.

As Reuters reported, “Rogue communication devices not listed in product documents have been found in some Chinese solar power inverters by U.S experts who strip down equipment hooked up to grids to check for security issues … Using the rogue communication devices to skirt firewalls and switch off inverters remotely, or change their settings, could destabilize power grids, damage energy infrastructure, and trigger widespread blackouts, experts said.”

As one source summarized it, “That effectively means there is a built-in way to physically destroy the grid.” Or, to put it in even simpler terms, the U.S. is purchasing Chinese equipment complete with a “kill switch” that would allow China to disable the U.S. power grid at any moment.

Even more concerning, the problem is not relegated to the United States. Britain’s GB News reported, “Chinese companies dominate the market for power inverters, with firms like Huawei and Sungrow controlling more than half the market in 2023, according to Wood Mackenzie research. The European Solar Manufacturing Council estimates that more than 200 gigawatts of European solar power capacity relies on Chinese-made inverters.” (One gigawatt is equal to one billion watts.)

As Christoph Podewils, the council’s secretary general, put it, “This means Europe has effectively surrendered remote control of a vast portion of its electricity infrastructure.”

The Chinese embassy in Washington dismissed the allegation.

The relatively sparse news coverage of this startling discovery is evidence of either the mainstream media’s complacency, or its intentional effort to downplay any development that might contradict its radical climate change narrative. Surely, this item led the evening newscasts on ABC, CBS and NBC, right? Sadly, no.

If ever there was a wakeup call regarding the urgent need for the U.S. to be even more committed to energy independence, it has arrived in the form of China’s ability to remotely turn off the U.S. power grid.

Fortunately, President Trump is working hard to reverse the Biden administration’s disastrous mandates that would have replaced affordable, reliable and increasingly clean traditional energy sources with untrustworthy and costly alternatives. Trump’s early declaration of a national energy emergency defined the dangers of relying on foreign sources of energy and spelled out several needed steps, including upgrades to our energy infrastructure.

But the added knowledge of Chinese subterfuge embedded within crucial components being installed in the U.S. electric grid adds even more urgency to the need to not only produce more domestic energy, but also to domestically develop more technology and manufacture more of the parts we currently import from outside U.S. borders.

While U.S. security experts should be lauded for discovering the Chinese “kill switches,” how many security threats have gone undetected? So-called “renewable” technologies like wind and solar were already suspect in regard to their reliability, as evidenced by the recent massive grid failure in Spain, Portugal and parts of France. We should be all the more wary of “alternatives” when the parts used to connect them to our power grids are sourced from foreign adversaries.

The episode again highlights the vital need for tougher regulations to ensure our nation’s energy security. The Empowerment Alliance’s model legislation – the Affordable, Reliable and Clean Energy Security act (ARC-ES) – would require “energy sources that are primarily produced within the U.S. and infrastructure that will reduce our reliance on foreign nations for critical materials and manufacturing.”

The time has passed for any reasonable argument suggesting that such legislation is not urgently needed, both at the federal and state levels. The notion of attacks from foreign adversaries on America’s energy infrastructure has often been the stuff of fantasy and “what-if” scenarios. Those have now been replaced with concrete evidence of nefarious, embedded components from a foreign superpower, just waiting for someone in Beijing to flip a switch and send Americans hurtling into a powerless abyss.

Let it sink in: China was secretly embedding technology in components shipped to the U.S. that could have triggered a massive power outage.

It’s time for Congress to embed a “kill switch” of its own on the ability of foreign countries to disable the U.S. power grid. That assurance can only come when we take America’s energy independence from being a worthy goal to a mandated reality.

Via American Greatness,

Senator Mike Lee (R-UT) has proposed a constitutional amendment that would make all members of Congress ineligible to run for reelection “whenever inflation exceeds 3%” or when the deficit exceeds 3% of gross domestic product (GDP).

The proposal revives an idea first suggested by Warren Buffett more than 10 years ago in which Buffett suggested he could “end the deficit in five minutes” by disqualifying lawmakers based on the nation’s economic health.

In a post on X, Lee wrote, “It’s better to disqualify politicians than for an entire nation to suffer under the yoke of inflation.”

I’m drafting a constitutional amendment

To oust every member of Congress

Whenever inflation exceeds 3%

It’s better to disqualify politicians

Than for an entire nation to suffer under the yoke of inflation

Please let me know what you think

And share if you like the idea https://t.co/yt8iPmIo5C

— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) June 5, 2025

Lee is among a handful of GOP Senators who have pushed back on the President Trump’s tax reconciliation and spending cuts package as it’s currently written, arguing that the measure doesn’t go far enough to reduce the national deficit.

Lee added, “Federal spending has become excessive. The resulting inflation harms Americans and weaponizes government. The Senate can make this bill better. It must now do so.”

The practicality of removing all members of Congress from office at once remains in question, as does the likelihood of how much support would be found among current lawmakers.

The House of Representatives recently passed President Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) which now awaits the Senate’s review and possible revision.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent defended the Congressional spending bill, saying, “We have to bring this down gradually because we want to do two things. We want to cut and constrain spending and we want to grow the economy.”

🚨 JUST IN: Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent gives his defense tonight of the Congressional spending bill – “I’m a fiscal hawk, but I’m also a realist.”

“The way to think about this is every $300 billion is 1% of GDP…we have to bring this down gradually because we want to do… pic.twitter.com/vq0Zm4wQ6W

— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) June 4, 2025

Elon Musk, who has publicly rebuked federal lawmakers over the OBBB, calling it “debt slavery” has endorsed Buffett’s plan to fix the deficit crisis as well as pushing for greater government efficiency and accountability.

Despite internal disagreements over what other federal spending to cut, Republican leaders continue to push for completing work on the reconciliation bill in time to have it reach the president’s desk by July 4.

Does your state support your 2nd Amendment rights or make it exceedingly difficult to keep and bear arms?

Here’s your chance to find out!

Ammo.com ranked the worst states for gun owners in 2025 by analyzing each state’s current laws, pending laws, concealed carry guidelines, self-defense statutes, and 2A-centric taxes.

Continue reading to see where your state stands!

Jump to a state: AL | AK | AZ | AR | CA | CO | CT | DE | FL | GA | HI | ID | IL | IN | IA | KS | KY | LA | ME | MD | MA | MI | MN | MS | MO | MT | NE | NV | NH | NJ | NM | NY | NC | ND | OH | OK | OR | PA | RI | SC | SD | TN | TX | UT | VT | VA | WA | WV | WI | WY

Report Highlights:

• Hawaii is the #1 worst state for gun owners due to strict purchasing and carry laws, as well as defying the Supreme Court on the individual’s right to carry.

• Massachusetts is the #2 worst state for gun owners due to its permit-to-purchase and reciprocity laws.

• California, New York, and Illinois take the #3, #4, and #5 spots in our list of worst states for gun ownership due to strict purchasing and carrying requirements.

• Ohio, North Carolina, and Maine take spots #25, #24, and #23 due to new restrictive legislation with some relaxed carry laws.

• Some states rank worse than others due to excessive infringements, additional taxes, and the current governors’ 2A statements.

• State and local laws defining “stand your ground” and “duty to retreat” vary, and should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.

What Did We Measure?

Let’s take a moment to analyze which factors make a state the worst for gun ownership. If we only consider purchasing requirements, then we neglect carrying requirements and use of force thresholds. So, we came up with a list based on the following factors:

1. Current gun laws

2. Current purchase laws

3. Current concealed carry weapon (CCW) guidelines

4. Reciprocity between other states

5. Sales tax

6. Current governor’s voting history

7. Stand your ground laws

Note: We are not lawyers and are not qualified to give legal advice. No information on Ammo.com is intended to be construed as legal advice. It’s essential to look at each state’s current local laws in addition to federal laws. For example, most states define “stand your ground” and “duty to retreat” differently. Explore the links below to better understand your state’s laws.

Read the full report on the Worst States to be a Gun Owner (2025 Updated) here…

Authored by John Haughley via The Epoch Times,

The need for data centers to drive 21st century cloud computing and win the AI race with China is a matter of such national urgency that Energy Secretary Chris Wright describes it as America’s “next Manhattan Project.”

But assessing how many data centers—a ubiquitous yet vague term for “server farms,” supercomputer networks, bitcoin and crypto “mines”—exist right now in the United States is, in itself, a foray into quixotic cloudy computing.

There were a “reported” 5,426 data centers in the United States in March, according to Statista.

Meanwhile, Denmark-based Data Center Map ApS counts 3,761 listed data centers in the United States. Data Centers.com, a global technology marketplace headquartered in Colorado, maintains there are 2,483 of the centers now operating nationwide.

These and other estimates confirm the consensus that the United States has five to 10 times the number of functioning data centers as any other country in the world, including China.  In fact, approximately half the planet’s data centers are in the United States, according to a ranking by Visual Capitalist.

And yet, as Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said during the April 30 Hill & Valley Forum, an annual gathering of congressional lawmakers and Silicon Valley venture capitalists, the need to build out the nation’s electric grid to power more data centers is “one of two existential threats we face as a country;” the other beingIran’s development of a nuclear weapon. If that need is not met, the nation will “lose the AI race with China.”

The projected energy demand for data centers will triple by 2028, the Department of Energy estimated last year. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation forecast the same number a year earlier.

These “load growth” assessments, coming after years of relative stagnation in electricity usage, were issued after the late-2022 advent of OpenAI’s ChatGPT. That shockwave rattled utilities, regional transmission operators, and state public utility commissions, sending them scrambling to scale-up electrical grids to accommodate this projected growth in data centers.

The result was a data center building spree. CBRE, a Texas-based commercial real estate services company, in late 2024 projected that more than 4,750 data center projects would break ground in the United States in 2025, “nearly as many … as already exist” nationwide.

New buildings to house data centers constitute “the fastest-growing segment of nonresidential construction planning,” according to a September 2024 Dodge Construction Network analysis.

However, there is no single-source registry documenting how many proposed data centers are now being reviewed before local planning boards.

That vagary was the genesis of Data Center Watch, a research firm tracking the trend and opposition to it, said founder Robert McKenzie, a former Columbia University adjunct professor of international and public affairs.

Much of the media coverage of data centers was “very specific, anecdotal” local news and social media reports, McKenzie told The Epoch Times.

“We hadn’t seen anybody pull together all the data. So we thought, ‘What would happen if you looked across the whole country?’ We weren’t sure what we were going to find.”

Data Centers.com, a global “technology marketplace” headquartered in Colorado, shows the locations of 2,483 data centers currently in operation in the United States. Illustration by The Epoch Times

In weekly updates gleaned from open-source Google searches, Data Center Watch has tracked two trends, McKenzie said, with the first being a larger number of data center proposals than initially thought.

The second trend is local opposition, which also helps track new data center projects.“There’s lots of anecdotal reporting from many, many outlets and bloggers about …local pushback here, pushback there; there’s more local opposition than certainly we would have imagined,” he said. “In other words, we keep hearing how these projects are coming, but they’re already here.”

In addition, load forecasting is difficult because many data center developers are submitting multiple proposals but only intend to build a few.At February’s National Association of Regional Utility Commissions’ Winter Energy Policy Conference, ALN Policy and Law President Angela Navarro told state public utility commissioners that utilities are seeing data center developers “cue shopping, looking for the best deal.”

Not in My Backyard

The rapid expansion of data centers is facing resistance from locals across the nation.

A March Data Center Watch report charted the emergence of at least 142 ad hoc local groups, across 28 states, “organizing to block data center construction and expansion” with $18 billion in proposed data centers “blocked” and $46 billion “delayed” between March 2023 and March 2025.

McKenzie acknowledged that the report, like Data Center Watch’s weekly updates, is an incomplete tabulation. It’s derived from “public statements or what’s happening at a town hall meeting, if there’s, like, a press release, or if there’s media coverage,” he said.

In an aerial view, an Amazon Web Services data center is seen in Stone Ridge, Va., on July 17, 2024. The United States had a reported 5,426 data centers in March 2025, a number the Energy Department projects will triple by 2028. Building data centers to power cloud computing has become a national priority as AI use soars, though the boom faces hurdles such as local opposition and power shortages. Nathan Howard/Getty Images

Nonetheless, what emerges is a tip-of-iceberg indication that data center proposals are roiling communities nationwide.

“Candidly, when we did [the March report], we thought, ‘Holy smokes, $64 billion in blocked or delayed?’” he said. “That gives you a sense of how much pushback there is at the local level.”

A February survey of 800 people in “16 key states targeted for AI data center development—where OpenAI and others are exploring expansion”—found 93 percent of respondents agreed that “cutting-edge AI data centers are vital to the United States.”

But only 35 percent of those queried in the survey “would vote ‘yes’ to data center construction in their hometown” if such a proposition was presented to them.

“There is clearly a disconnect between what the local residents experience and what is being sold to these communities from developers,” survey author Joe Warnimont said.

“It’s not necessarily about opposing technology in their communities,” he told The Epoch Times.

“It’s more that people in these communities want to maintain control over resources and development, whereas that’s clearly not necessarily the case right now.”

The Data Center Watch report, HostingAdvice.com survey, and a casual Google search unspool a gamut of objections. Some are unique to specific sites in specific communities, but most cite common concerns such as demand for electricity, need for water, noise complaints, and possible devaluation of nearby property values.

Opponents generally question whether the projects will generate the jobs other uses could create. They often allege that local governments are being seduced by developers into offering tax breaks and incentives—shielded by non-disclosure agreements. Or, they report that local governments are being preempted by state legislatures that limit municipal planners from rejecting or modifying proposals.

A construction crew works on a CloudHQ data center in Ashburn, Va., on July 17, 2024. As projected data centers boom nationwide, state utility commissions are racing to expand electrical grids to meet soaring demand. Nathan Howard/Getty Images

Bipartisan Backlash

The backlash against the projects is bipartisan. Locals don’t welcome data center projects despite enthusiasm for AI, making data centers the new not-in-my-back-yard flashpoint, the Data Center Watch report concluded.

“Where communities once rallied against factories, warehouses, or retail sprawl, they’re now opposing data centers,” the report states.

“From noise and water usage to power demands and property values, server farms have become a new target in the broader backlash against large-scale development. The landscape of local resistance is shifting—and data centers are squarely in the crosshairs.”

“I don’t know if [local opposition] has anything to do with political affiliation. It’s just, ‘Do I want this in my backyard or not?’” Warnimont said.

“This is absolutely across-the-aisle stuff,” Kamil Cook, a climate and clean energy associate with Public Citizen Texas, said about local opposition to data center development in the Lone Star State.

In rural Texas, that means data center opponents are typically bright red Republicans.

“Most of the groups we work with are, like, Republican-leaning people who are wanting to stop this build out,” he told The Epoch Times. “All the groups we’ve been supporting have had very close ties with their local Republican Party. It’s very local, like … the Republican county chair, for example.”

Four Waves

Data Center Coalition communications director Jon Hukill said most criticisms leveled at data center projects are standard land-use challenges, which would surface regardless of what the specific proposal was.

Hukill’s six-year-old, 36-member, Washington-based trade association represents “hyperscalers”—corporations such as Meta, AWS, and Microsoft—and “co-location” companies, such as Equinix, which own data centers leased to operators.

“I think what you’re seeing is reflective of the increasing number of states and communities where data centers are developing,” he told The Epoch Times. He noted that not only are these operations new in public perception but many are being proposed and built in “secondary” and “tertiary” markets that historically have had little industrial development.

Hukill said there have been four general waves in the evolution of data centers, which emerged in the 2000s with the growth of the internet.

The first wave, he said, was in New York and New Jersey, “because of the closeness to Wall Street—the need for very fast transactions.”

The second wave took root in California’s Silicon Valley and in northern Virginia, which is commonly referred to as “Data Center Alley” and has the world’s most dense concentration of data centers, Hukill said.

The third wave is unfolding in secondary markets, such as suburban or exurban communities in Ohio and Georgia, he said, and increasingly, in tertiary markets as well.

“Really, just in the last couple of years, we’ve seen the development of tertiary markets where there’s really been very little history of data center development whatsoever. Think of places like Mississippi, Alabama, Iowa, Indiana,” Hukill said. “This is where the opposition is coming from.”

There are numerous reasons for that development, such as less expensive land, affordable energy, water availability, and local governments eager for economic development.

“There’s been much more interest in [tertiary markets] where you’re starting to see more and more investments—you know, ‘billion with a B’-type investments—in some of those states where, typically, those were only happening in those primary markets,” Hukill said. “It’s important to understand the data center industry is not monolithic.”

Land-use attorney Colleen Gillis, founder of Reston, Va.-based Curata Partners, is a veteran of planning and zoning battles before local boards in Loudoun County and elsewhere in Data Center Alley. She’s also a member of the Urban Land Institute’s Data Center Product Council. The organization’s Local Guidelines for Data Center Development address common issues raised by developers and critics.

In an aerial view, data centers are seen near a neighborhood in Ashburn, Va., on July 17, 2024. Northern Virginia, known as “Data Center Alley,” hosts the world’s highest concentration of data centers. Nathan Howard/Getty Images

“You know,” Gillis told The Epoch Times, “some of the challenges data centers have are contextual. Where’s it located? What’s the visual or compatibility impact there?

“In some jurisdictions where, perhaps, the population growth is rapid, and traffic is a challenge, and school building or school capacity is a challenge,” Gills continued, criticism is general angst over growth and development, not necessarily specifically about data centers.

Developers have recognized that these local challenges are legitimate, she said. “It’s a little bit like AI learning. Data center companies get better at understanding what do they need to do to be a good neighbor.”

But “misconceptions” remain, Gillis said, including, “If you have a data center in Place A, the data center you put in Place B is going to be the same—the same impacts and the same challenges, the same use of water, the same use of electricity.”

Point Counter Point

The most commonly cited issues with proposed data center projects are their voracious demand for electricity and  water, resulting noise, and job generation.

Other issues, such as the tax revenues the projects generate, development incentives shielded by non-disclosure agreements, or state legislatures preempting municipal planners from rejecting proposals, are also among common issues, each meriting separate analyses.

Electricity

Fast-tracked data center development will cost ratepayers in 13 Midwest states as much as $9.4 billion beginning this year, according to Monitoring Analytics, the grid’s independent market monitor. Those 65 million consumers span 1,100 member utilities within the PJM Interconnection regional transmission organization.

According to a December 2024 Energy Department analysis, data centers consume 10 to 50 times as much energy, per square foot, as a commercial office building of similar size.

An Amazon Data Services data center campus in Pennsylvania’s Lucerne County will eventually consume the same electricity it takes to power the entire city of Pittsburgh, a senior manager at Amazon, told the Pennsylvania Capital-Star.

Goldman Sachs Research forecasts global power demand from data centers will increase 50 percent by 2027 and by as much as 165 percent by the end of the decade.

And whereas data centers consumed about 4 percent of the country’s electricity in 2023, they could account for up to 12 percent of total U.S. electricity consumption by 2028, according to a December 2024  Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory report.

Protect PT Executive Director Gillian Graber, whose nonprofit opposes a proposed data center project in Westmoreland County, said among reasons local residents are concerned is “the demand that data centers will bring onto the grid.”

“Pennsylvanians could see an increased cost in utilities as a result—electric and gas utilities,” she told The Epoch Times.

“The availability of power is the pacing challenge of industry, and that’s true of the data center industry, but it’s also true of all 21st century industries,” Hukill said.

“Part of the reason [to expand the grid] is because of the demand for data center services. Partially, it’s because of re-shoring and manufacturing. It’s the electrification of everything, businesses, electric vehicles, appliances. These are large loads, too.”

Many data center developers prefer renewable energies such as wind, solar, and nuclear rather than natural gas or coal, but cannot wait for small modular nuclear reactors to become widely available. They’ll go where energy is available. That’s according to Aaron Tinjum, vice president of energy policy for the Data Center Coalition, speaking during a February energy policy conference in Washington.

Many are also seeking to “co-locate” on utility power plant sites, retired coal-fired plants, or to build their own electric generators that, instead of tapping into the grid, can add capacity.

A data center owned by Amazon Web Services (front R) is under construction beside the Susquehanna nuclear power plant in Berwick, Pa., on Jan. 14, 2024. Ted Shaffrey/AP Photo

“We’ve got clients who said, ‘You know, look, it’s going to take you too long to get the power to us. We‘ll figure out self-generation between now and then [and] whatever we don’t need, we’ll sell back to you,” Gillis said.

Data centers need baseload power, Loudoun County Supervisor Mike Turner said in his influential June 2024 white paper for local planners, A Strategy for a Changing Paradigm.

Renewables aren’t sufficient for data center needs, he notes. “The average data center would require 1,000 acres of solar panels,” he said, noting the 62-turbine wind energy plant on Martha’s Vineyard would only provide enough juice to support about 10 of Loudoun County’s data centers.

Hukill cited a December 2024 analysis by Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit & Review Commission, which said that “Data centers are currently paying the full cost of service for the energy they use, and current rates appropriately allocate costs to the customers responsible for incurring them” without raising costs for others.

Water

Data centers consume a great deal of water to cool servers. According to a July 2024 University of Tulsa analysis, a single data center can consume up to 5 million gallons of water a day. That’s “enough to supply thousands of households or farms.”

Microsoft’s 2022 Sustainability Report showed that its data center water consumption increased 34 percent from 2021 to 2022. A Meta 2023 report said its data centers used approximately 1.29 billion gallons in 2022.

But data center technology is evolving and few “data centers 2.0 and 3.0” need that type of water use, with most recycling water and using different technologies to cool servers, Gillis said.

“A couple of years ago, all the data centers [used] evaporative cooling. That meant that they used a lot of water to cool down the data center.” Few do that now, she said.

Citing Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit & Review Commission report, Hukill said in 2023, “83 percent of data centers in Virginia used the same amount of water—or less—than the average large office building.”

However, in the same tertiary markets where energy is often available and relatively inexpensive, such as outside Phoenix, Arizona, where dozens of data center campuses were operating in December 2024, water can be scarce.

A May Bloomberg News analysis determined that two-thirds of data centers built in the United States are “in highly water-stressed areas.” About 20 percent of “rely “moderately to highly stressed watersheds” resulting from drought and other factors, Berkeley Lab research scientist Arman Shehabi wrote in 2024.

Water cooling pumps and pipes are seen at Intergate.Manhattan, a data center owned by Sabey Data Center Properties, in the lower Manhattan area in New York on March 20, 2013. The vast water use of data centers is one of the top concerns for proposed projects nationwide, along with their heavy power demand, noise, and limited job creation. Stan Honda/AFP via Getty Images

Data center water-use can be a factor even in areas with abundant water resources, such as western Pennsylvania.

“In addition to your typical site location, noise, light pollution, those kind of things, water usage is a big concern,” Graber said. “These data centers will be run by gas-fired power plants, and gas-fired power plants need gas, and we already have a tremendous amount of water usage from the fracking industry on our local resources.”

In Pennsylvania’s Westmoreland County, Beaver Run Reservoir, a major regional source of drinking water, was affected by extended periods of drought  “at least two years in a row,” Graber said. Meanwhile, “fracking companies were still withdrawing our water. So while every day Pennsylvanians were asked to conserve water, the fracking industry was still taking the water.”

Water used to cool data center servers can be used for “other things like golf courses.”  It eventually finds its way back into creeks and streams and is processed through the water cycle, Graber said.

However, water used to frack the gas that fuels data centers “has to be put into injection wells. It can’t be cleaned to the point where it’s going to be used for human consumption and, so, it completely takes this water out of the water table.”

Noise

Generators, HVAC cooling systems, and drawing power from energy from the grid can produce a buzz “comparable to the noise of a lawnmower or a busy city street.” At up to 96 decibels that could lead to hearing loss at sustained exposure, according to a Sensear study.

But again, as a Data Center Knowledge primer points out, noise complaints from nearby residents have prompted adjustments such as “mufflers” and “dampeners” to keep noise levels off-site down.

Data centers are actually “quieter than many common sounds—jets, lawn-mowers, conversations at three feet,” Hukill said. Data center sound “is not harmful to human hearing, and is rarely loud enough to violate noise ordinances,” he said, adding, “A large majority of data centers do not generate noise complaints.”

That claim is documented in the Virginia Legislature analysis, he said. “There are now sound dampeners. If a community says that the chilling units that sit on top of a data center [are] maybe too loud, data center companies have worked to put in sound dampeners to reduce that noise.”

Server banks inside a data center at AEP headquarters in Columbus, Ohio, on May 20. John Minchillo/AP Photo

Job Generation

According to Area Development Magazine, building a typical data center creates hundreds of jobs for skilled trades such as electricians and engineers. But long-term, on-site employment generated by data centers is generally lower than that of other industries like manufacturing or corporate headquarters, according to an August 2024 Pro Publica report.

The report noted that “data centers employ relatively few people on a permanent basis. Overseeing the servers doesn’t take much labor compared with other large industrial outfits, and the facilities are easy to distinguish from other hulking manufacturing buildings because of their small or mostly empty parking lots.”

The relatively few jobs—some describe data centers as “one job for every two acres occupied”—was a recurring criticism in the HostingAdvice.com survey, Warnimont said.

“I would definitely agree” that’s among the biggest reasons why people oppose them, he said, noting that many people say, “If it brings a ton of jobs …  maybe I would like it. But if not, maybe not.”

However, the lack of job creation surrounding data centers “is a common misperception,” Hukill said, pointing to a February PriceWaterhouseCoopers report.  The report determined that between 2017 and 2023, “the data center industry supported up to 4.7 million jobs across the country,” with each direct data center job supporting “more than six jobs elsewhere” in the United States.

“There might be this common conception out there that if you go to an average data center, it may have 50, maybe 100, full-time badged employees,” he said. “But those numbers really don’t capture the scope of the number of jobs that are supporting that data center.”

For instance, Hukill said, a co-location or “colo” data center that leases space to computer network operators, similar to the way a retail shopping works, adds another layer of employees who manage and maintain the property.

In that situation, in addition to employees of the company that owns the building, you have “all the other tenants, employees that are technical workers and high-tech workers that keep the servers running,” he said. Those employees are “typically not counted” in many employment counts.

Transparency

Objections may vary from proposal to proposal and site to site. But a common claim is that state and local governments offer data center projects tax incentives, often shielded from public scrutiny through non-disclosure agreements under the guise of proprietary corporate intelligence.

The lack of transparency fosters suspicion and anger, Cook said. “Just from our experience, it seems like one of the big concerns is that, yeah, there is no community outreach.”

He added, “There’s no method by which the community can be informed in a way that actually makes it seem like their voice is valued and that they have a choice in these matters.”

As Russia and Ukraine continue sending record amounts of drones across their border, in what are now nightly aerial raids, Moscow has significantly stepped up its ground offensive, over the weekend announcing it has begun advancing into Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region for the first time in the three-year-plus long war, marking a significant territorial escalation amid stalled peace talks.

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the advance serves as a warning to the Zelensky government to accept “realities on the ground.”

The full social media statement said that “Those who do not want to recognize the realities of the war at negotiations, will receive new realities on the ground.”

A the same time the Russia’s army published photos showing troops raising the Russian flag over the village of Zorya in the Donetsk region, in an area close to the internal border with Dnipropetrovsk oblast, amid the westward push.

Russia’s defense ministry on Sunday further announced that forces from a tank unit had “reached the western border of the Donetsk People’s Republic and are continuing to develop an offensive in the Dnipropetrovsk region.”

Troops raising Russian flag over the westernmost building in the village of Zorya in the Donetsk region:

💪Our fighters raised the Russian flag over the westernmost building in the village of Zarya in the DPR. The servicemen destroyed a significant number of militants and equipment, and cleared the territory.

Fortified positions, defensive structures, and fire weapons of the enemy… pic.twitter.com/kqL7C8Fk1J

— Zlatti71 (@Zlatti_71) June 8, 2025

The Ukrainian government has yet to issue public response to the new advance, but a military officer told AFP that there is indeed slow Russian progress near the regional border. According to the same report, there are reasons to believe that Russia could soon take a key city there:

Ukrainian military personnel previously told AFP that Russia could advance relatively quickly in the largely flat region, given there were fewer natural obstacles or villages that could be used as defensive positions by Kyiv’s forces.

The region and in particular the city of Dnipro — have been under persistent Russian strikes since Moscow invaded in February 2022.

Russia used Dnipro as a testing ground for its “experimental” Oreshnik missile in late 2024, claiming to have struck an aeronautics production facility.

The Dnipropetrovsk region had a pre-war population of three million, and remains a key industrial hub, and Ukraine’s military has vowed to keep up resistance on the front lines.

In stalled peace negotiations, Moscow has demanded that Ukraine recognize that the territories of the Donbass have now been absorbed into the Russian Federation – something which Zelensky has refused to do.

Dnipropetrovsk is not among four territories formally claimed by Russia (and based on prior ‘popular referendums’ in the east) – however if Russian forces begin occupying it, this certainly could be added by Moscow the keep of the pressure and leverage on Kiev.

Massive amounts of suicide drones have been launched by Russia on Sunday, reports say…

BREAKING:

Intense Russian suicide drone attack against Ukraine.

Around 100 Russian drones are in the air, with most of them targeting the Sumy region pic.twitter.com/l3uQYqrrdI

— Visegrád 24 (@visegrad24) June 8, 2025

It’s also a clear sign that the Trump-backed peace process is going no where, and has had no impact on battlefield realities whatsoever. The Trump administrition has lately made comments suggesting that it could become less interventionist in the conflict, and might wait out the fight, instead of pressuring the sides for peace.

“Sometimes you see two young children fighting like crazy, they hate each other and they’re fighting in a park,” Trump had said on Thursday while commenting on the war. “Sometimes you’re better off letting them fight for a while and then pulling them apart,” he added. This suggests the US president is frustrated and ready for a more hands off approach, but will he also cut off the flow of aid and arms to Ukraine?

Authored by James Rickards via DailyReckoning.com,

Whatever happened to the Donald Trump and Elon Musk visit to Fort Knox?

You’ll recall the buzz from earlier this year. Trump and Musk loudly announced they were going to visit the U.S. bullion depository at Fort Knox, Kentucky to make sure the U.S. gold was actually there. The press was invited to tag along. Musk claimed that his DOGE team was ready to “audit” the gold bars to see that there were none missing. I had my own views on the announcement (described below) but I certainly agreed this would be the mother of all photo ops.

For the record, the U.S. Treasury holds 8,133.5 metric tonnes of gold in the U.S. reserve position. Slightly less than half of this gold is stored in Fort Knox. The remainder is mostly stored in a secure vault at West Point, New York. The exact location of that vault is classified although I happen to know where it is. A small amount is held at the Denver Mint for coinage purposes. Legally the U.S. Treasury owns the gold reserve, but I point out that the U.S. Army actually controls it since almost all of the gold is stored on two Army bases – Fort Knox and West Point.

A Fort Knox Extravaganza

None of this nuance about storage and location deterred Trump and Musk. In the popular imagination, all of the gold is in Fort Knox. That’s where they were headed to prove once and for all that the gold was actually there. Elon Musk planned to livestream the entire visit using his Starlink satellite system. Trump vaguely threatened that if any gold were missing, there would be disastrous consequences for any wrongdoers who removed it. The plot was set. The drama seemed irresistible.

As an aside, I was hoping that Trump and Musk were each reasonably fit and had been lifting some free weights. Gold is heavy! In fact, it’s one of the most dense materials in the periodic table of the elements, leaving aside radioactive elements like uranium and some of the trace elements that only exist in minute atomic-level quantities. A standard 400-Troy Ounce bar weighs 27.4 pounds in the English system. I’ve lifted a few during my visits to secure gold vaults. I always smile for the camera, but inside it takes a lot of strength to keep the gold bar in the air. I was concerned that Trump or Musk might strain their backs putting on a show for the press.

Trump mentioned the proposed visit to Fort Knox in a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron. He mentioned it to reporters aboard Air Force One. He mentioned his plan again in remarks before the National Governors Association Conference and at the Conservative Political Action Committee (CPAC) annual meeting.

Then suddenly the whole story went away. Trump never mentioned it again after February 26. Musk went radio silent on the topic after April 6. There was no visit to Fort Knox. There was no announcement about why there would be no visit. It was as if the whole story never happened. It just went away.

Now, Elon Musk is leaving his position as head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). That was always in the cards. Musk’s appointment was as a temporary government employee; he was always going to leave about now. But why not put on a memorable gold show during his time in office? It simply never happened.

The Question Is, Why?

Let’s answer that beginning with the obvious point that the gold is all there. There have been rumors of missing and stolen gold almost from the day the bullion depository was built. Some suggested that European bankers stole the gold in the 1930s. Others said the Rockefeller clan looted the gold. The 1964 James Bond film Goldfinger is built around a plot to steal the gold.

This speculation makes for good rumor-mongering but, in fact, the gold is all present and accounted for. The last public audit was conducted in 1974, but annual audits are done by the U.S. Treasury (although the results are not made public). Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recently said, “I can tell the American people … all the gold is there.”

If the gold is there (and it is), then why not go ahead with the visit? It would be great PR in any event and would reassure a skeptical American public.

A Money Monopoly

There are two reasons why the visit did not proceed and why you won’t hear more about it.

The first one is that the U.S. government and the Federal Reserve (Fed) do not want to call attention to gold’s role as a monetary asset. The Fed (along with commercial banks) has a monopoly on the money printing press. The government has done everything possible to diminish and deny the role of gold as money, beginning with FDR’s confiscation of gold from U.S. citizens in 1933 and continuing through Nixon’s closing of the gold window for foreign trading partners in 1971. At this point, we have three generations of students since 1971 who know almost nothing about gold.

Gold is not taught in economics classes. Gold is not discussed in economic or Fed policy circles. Younger students don’t even know that the U.S. was ever on a gold standard or that gold once circulated freely as a form of money (usually in ¼-ounce or 8-gram coins). The government has eradicated any memory of gold as money. Why bring it back to life with a high-profile visit to Fort Knox? Better just to ignore gold if you want to maintain your money monopoly.

Of course, gold is a monetary asset. As noted, the U.S. has 8,133 metric tonnes (tonnes). Germany has 3,351 tonnes. Italy has 2,452 tonnes. France has 2,437 tonnes. Russia has 2,333 tonnes. And China reports that they have 2,292 tonnes although they are non-transparent and probably have much more. Among multilateral institutions, the European Central Bank has 506 tonnes and the IMF has 2,814 tonnes. If all of the members of the Euro area including the ECB combined their gold holdings, they would have 10,770 tonnes. All of these holdings should be put in the context of 36,118 tonnes, which is the amount of combined official gold holdings of every country in the world.

The Top 10 Gold Reserve Holdings By Country

Why have such large gold holdings persisted for a century or more in some cases and increase on a continual basis if gold is not money? The question answers itself. Gold is a form of money.

It’s simply the case that major countries don’t want to acknowledge it because they want to maintain their monopoly on paper money, or they are still acquiring it and don’t want to spike the price, at least until they complete their acquisition programs. One of the Marx Brothers’ classic punchlines was, “Who ya gonna believe … me or your own eyes?” When it comes to gold, I believe my own eyes. Official holdings of 36,118 metric tonnes of gold bullion tell me all I need to know.

The Leasing Scheme

There’s another even more insidious reason why Trump and Musk backed off from their Fort Knox visit. Even allowing for the fact that the gold is actually in Fort Knox the deeper question is whether that gold is leased?

Gold leasing is an established market but not well-understood by non-specialists. Even experts in stocks and bonds know little about gold leasing. Basically, it’s a way for a gold holder to earn a return. Gold does not pay dividends or interest like stocks and bonds. But you can lease it to a third party and make 2% or so annually in lease payments. The party leasing the gold does not back up a truck and take it away. The gold stays in the original vault. Gold leasing is a purely paper transaction.

The gold lessor gets the lease payment. The lessee gets what’s called a right of rehypothecation. That means the lessee can lease the same gold to another party. And that party can lease it to a fourth party and so on. With rehypothecation in play, one metric tonne of gold could support 100 metric tonnes of “paper gold” transactions.

At each step in the chain, a party acts like it owns the gold for its own purposes of further leases or sales of “unallocated” gold. Everyone has price exposure and can make money if the price of gold goes up or lose money if the price of gold goes down. The same principle applies to gold futures, gold options, gold swaps, gold ETFs and an entire world of gold derivative transactions. The point is that the paper gold world is leveraged about 100:1 to the physical gold world starting with the physical gold in Fort Knox.

The danger is obvious. It’s no different than any run on the bank when it comes to bank deposits. If a group of paper gold investors suddenly demands physical delivery, the counterparties have to buy gold in the spot market since the leased gold is not in their physical possession. The gold market is liquid, but not liquid enough to support delivery if there were demand for more physical than a small slice of the paper gold market. A full-scale gold panic could emerge quickly. The spot price of gold would go to $25,000 per ounce before an investor could yell “buy!”

I take it that someone (possibly Scott Bessent) sat down and patiently explained the paper gold reality to Trump and Musk.

Once you understand how the market actually works, you quickly back away from putting on a show at Fort Knox. For the masterminds of the paper gold market at JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs, the less said about gold the better. They need to keep the game going. And that’s why Trump and Musk won’t be showing up at Fort Knox anytime soon.

For the rest of us, the solution to this problem is simple – buy gold.

Authored by Mollie Engelhart via The Epoch Times,

Why is it that the organic apple must wear a label, pay a certification fee, and carry a price premium—while the conventional apple, grown with chemical fertilizers and synthetic pesticides, is simply called an apple?

What if we flipped that?

What if the organic apple was just an apple—and the one grown with chemical inputs had to be labeled chemically grown? Why does the burden fall on the farmer doing the right thing, while the one using harmful practices skates by without warning, cost, or consequence?

Why does the farmer who’s working with nature—protecting our water, preserving our soil, and nourishing our communities—have to pay extra, while the farmer who’s polluting gets to do so for free? Why is the financial burden on the one not doing the damage?

Our rules make it harder to farm responsibly. A chemical farmer can spray right up to the edge of their fence line, but an organic farmer must give up 25 feet on all sides—and sell that buffer zone as non-organic. How does that make any sense?

We claim to want cleaner food, cleaner water, and a healthier planet. But the regulations say otherwise. They punish the farmer doing what’s best for humanity and reward the one taking shortcuts that come with long-term consequences.

Meanwhile, foreign-owned corporations—some with deeply troubling records abroad—are seeking permission to be traded on U.S. stock exchanges. Others continue selling toxic chemical products in the U.S. that are banned in their own countries. Why are we opening our doors to this? Why do we reward bad actors while the honest, hardworking American farmer drowns in red tape?

The system is rigged. It pushes farmers toward chemical dependency—not because they want to—but because doing the right thing is cost-prohibitive and over-regulated. Organic farmers pay annual fees and a percentage of their sales just to carry the label. They’re taxed not just financially, but logistically and emotionally—while conventional farmers get a free pass to pollute.

Imagine if we flipped it. What if the farmer spraying chemicals paid for that privilege? What if the cost and the burden were placed where the actual harm occurs? Wouldn’t that make more sense—for humans, animals, pollinators, soil, and future generations?

Consider this: research has shown that living within a mile of a golf course significantly increases your risk of Parkinson’s. Why? Because of a widely used herbicide that’s banned in other countries, yet still sold here—often by foreign companies that won’t allow its use in their own homeland. Why do we allow that without tax, penalty, or even a warning label?

Even within the regenerative and organic movements, we’re adding roadblocks. Equity audits have been folded into some certification programs. While I believe all men are created equal in the image of God, blending social justice metrics into a farming standard makes the transition away from chemical farming even less accessible to the very farmers we’re trying to reach. If we want to include social goals, let’s create a separate certification for those values. But let farming standards focus on soil, animals, and food.

On my farm, as on many others, men and women often do different jobs. Pay parity audits don’t reflect that nuance. Racial equity standards can also become murky when most of the labor force is a different ethnicity than the family that owns the farm. I used to joke, “I’m the only white person here—and I’m the one paying to keep this place going. I don’t even get paid—so is that equity?”

And here’s the bigger question: why are we trusting distant bureaucracies to keep our food safe instead of trusting our neighbors and fellow American farmers?

We’ve been conditioned to believe that federal regulation protects us, but often, it protects itself. Bureaucracy and red tape don’t make food healthier—they make it harder and more expensive to grow. They widen the gap between citizens and their food, and between intention and impact.

We are so far removed from functioning as a constitutional republic that many Americans don’t even remember that’s what we are. But it’s time we return to that foundation—where power is decentralized, communities are strong, and individuals take responsibility for what they grow, eat, and support.

We need less regulation and more relationship. We need to know who’s growing our food. We need to support local systems—small farms, medium farms, and large local farms that feed their communities. We need to rebuild a robust hub-and-spoke food network that serves people, not just centralized corporations.

Why is raw milk illegal in many states, while shelf-stable, ultra-processed food-like substances—linked to chronic disease—are perfectly legal? We’re afraid of the wrong bogeyman. We’re being lulled to sleep by the illusion of convenience, but there are real consequences: to our health, our water, our soil, and the survival of the American family farm.

If we want a food system that supports health, freedom, and regeneration, we must stop rewarding the polluters and punishing the protectors.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZerHedge.

Authored by Kenneth Tashky via The Epoch Times,

When it was recently reported that protesters disrupted Columbia University’s graduation ceremony, one might ask: which one?

In addition to its main commencement, Columbia hosts no fewer than 10 separate graduation ceremonies, often referred to as affinity graduations. These include distinct events for black, Latino, Asian, LGBTQIA+, Jewish, native, international, disabled, and first-generation/low-income students.

While Columbia claims that it has a “long history” of offering race-based and other segregated graduation ceremonies, this practice only dates back to 2005.

To put this in perspective, Columbia was founded in 1754. For more than 250 years, the university held a single, unified commencement ceremony for all graduates, celebrating their shared academic achievements without division by race, ethnicity, or gender identity.

Rather than continuing to use commencement to reinforce the institution’s collective mission and foster cohesion around a common student experience, Columbia has chosen to separate and segregate students based on race and other identity-based characteristics.

Columbia is not alone. Numerous institutions, including Princeton University, American University, Penn State University, University of Colorado, Fresno State University, and the College of William and Mary, host graduation ceremonies based on what a student looks like, their sexual preferences, who they pray to, or their ancestry.

These programs prioritize individual identity over the collective and common student experience, separating the campus into demographic silos and undermining the shared values, accomplishments, and sense of community that higher education is meant to cultivate.

Segregating students in this manner is not just limited to graduation programs. Across higher education, students are sorted into housing, orientation programs, and campus organizations based on their race and other identifying factors.

The National Association of Scholars has described the practice as “neo-segregation,” resembling a modern, albeit more palatable, version of the discriminatory and unconstitutional “separate but equal” doctrine.

Aided by college institutions, minority students are “simply conscripted to the new racially segregated normal.”

What is astonishing about this practice is that it’s being carried out by the very same higher education industry that has long proclaimed the indispensable value of achieving student body diversity and inclusion.

We have been told for years that creating diversity in higher education is essential to the educational experience and prepares students to participate in an increasingly complex and pluralistic society.

According to Lee Bollinger, former president of the University of Michigan and Columbia University, racial diversity “is vital” to the student experience. “Diversity is not merely a desirable addition to a well-rounded education. It is as essential as the study of the Middle Ages, of international politics and of Shakespeare.”

Paul Alivisatos, president of the University of Chicago, regards racial diversity and inclusion as essential to his institution’s educational mission, describing it as “foundational to our academic success” and “providing a transformative education for our students.”

Yet while higher education continues to champion racial diversity as fundamental to its mission, its current practices reveal a troubling contradiction.

Institutions cannot achieve the fundamental promise that diversity fosters greater connection and mutual understanding between students if they are promoting or permitting division and disunity based on the very characteristics diversity is purportedly intended to embrace.

If diversity is to have any real value to the educational experience, it cannot be realized by dividing students into demographic groups and “celebrating” them in isolation.

Rather, it requires bringing people together—across lines of race, class, gender, and ideology—to engage in the hard, messy and challenging work of learning from one another as individuals.

More than two decades ago, the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Antonin Scalia, issued a blistering dissenting opinion warning higher education against segregating students based on race under the pretense of promoting student diversity and inclusion.

Skeptical of using race as a factor in college admissions to engineer diversity, Scalia strongly denounced “those universities that talk the talk of multiculturalism and racial diversity in the courts but walk the walk of tribalism and racial segregation on their campuses through minority-only student organizations, separate minority housing opportunities, separate minority student centers, even separate minority-only graduation ceremonies.”

At the time, some may have discounted Justice Scalia’s warning as the cynical musings of a conservative jurist. Now, with the benefit of time, his words appear prophetic and cast a long shadow over the current trend of racial segregation prevalent throughout higher education.

Scalia’s cautionary note also raises legitimate questions about the value and necessity previously attributed to achieving student body diversity if, once attained, students and their institutions conspire to impose self-segregating programs and activities.

Ultimately, higher education cannot have it both ways. It cannot, on the one hand, champion diversity as a unifying force, fundamental to its educational mission, while on the other promote and encourage practices that fragment students along lines of identity and difference, undermining the very mission it claims to uphold.

Justice Scalia was prophetic, indeed.

*  *  *

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times or ZeroHedge.

President Trump’s trade war with China is set to deliver a blow to U.S. drone enthusiasts—and potentially commercial users—as Chinese drone giant DJI withholds the release of its new Mavic 4 Pro from the American market.

Nikkei Asia reports the new Mavic 4 Pro model won’t be released in the U.S. due to Trump’s tariffs and heightened security restrictions. The $2,000 drone, launched in other major markets on May 13, features a 100-megapixel camera and advanced imaging capabilities. 

One gimbal. Three lenses. Unlimited creative control using the Infinity Gimbal with 360° rotation🎥✨

See how the DJI Mavic 4 Pro captures cinematic shots across all focal lengths — from BTS to final edit.

Created by IG/ashiakseem#DJIMavic4Pro #AerialCinematography… pic.twitter.com/v2TMmEaX8F

— DJI (@DJIGlobal) May 22, 2025

“As with many global companies, our market strategy has to respond to local conditions and the environment surrounding the industry,” DJI told Nikkei, adding, “We are monitoring the situation and proactively looking for a solution.”

DJI is also concerned about the possibility of being blacklisted without due process under new U.S. security rules that require a review of Chinese-made technology products. 

Several U.S. government entities have restricted or banned the use of DJI drones over national security concerns, particularly regarding data privacy and ties to the Communist Chinese.

Here’s a list of federal-level bands:

Department of Defense (DoD):

• In 2017, the U.S. Army issued a ban on the use of DJI drones due to “cyber vulnerabilities.”

• In 2022, the DoD listed DJI as a Chinese military company, effectively blacklisting it under Section 1260H of the FY21 NDAA.

Department of Commerce:

• In December 2020, DJI was added to the Entity List, restricting U.S. companies from exporting technology to DJI without a special license. This move cited DJI’s role in human rights abuses involving surveillance in Xinjiang.

Lawmakers on Capitol Hill have introduced multiple bills to ban federal agencies from purchasing DJI drones, including the American Security Drone Act, which aims to restrict federal procurement of drones from “foreign adversaries” like China.  

Instead of the Mavic 4 Pro, DJI will consider rolling out other new models, though the company did not specify which ones.

A spokesperson noted, “We will address various uncertainties to mitigate their impact and work actively to ensure customers can access our products without delay.”

Meanwhile, the U.S. faces an urgent need to reshore its small drone supply chain, as China maintains the number one spot. The race to dominate the 2030s will be defined by control over critical technologies—drones, EVs, space systems, clean tech, semiconductors, and mobile devices. Right now, the U.S. is playing catch-up.