From the front row to the hot seat — what the midterms mean for Big Tech

Big Tech is scrambling to repair its relationships with Democrats after the midterm elections shifted power in Washington, TechCrunch reports. For two years, many Silicon Valley leaders cultivated President Donald Trump, attending White House events, cutting back DEI programs and giving millions to allied super PACs, while benefiting from tax breaks, paused federal investigations and lighter AI rules. Just before the vote, OpenAI hired Jessica Schumer, daughter of Sen. Chuck Schumer, and began calling its data centers "compute campuses."

J.B. Branch of Public Citizen called such moves PR washing and predicted more public-private partnerships like OpenAI's deal with the American Federation of Teachers, Anthropic's Claude Corps and Meta's America's Workforce Academy. Meta president Dina Powell McCormick said at WSJ Tech that companies must work with whatever government voters elect. Alice Marwick of Data & Society argued the pivot comes too late.

Aryan Ranjan, founder of campaign software firm Baraza, expects gridlock federally and most action in states, which have already sued tech firms and passed laws on chatbots and deepfakes despite a Trump executive order last December creating an AI Litigation Task Force to challenge them. He said Democrats will likely frame AI around electricity bills, data-center siting and jobs. Data center moratoriums are also gaining ground.

Markets add pressure: a trillion-dollar sell-off the day after the election reportedly has some investors rethinking Anthropic's reported trillion-dollar IPO. Branch warned an AI bubble could burst on Trump's watch, while a White House official said the president remains committed to American leadership in superintelligence.