*Trailer* On the Record: Charles County w/ Evan Smith

This is a trailer the full episode will be released on 6/10!

Join host Carlos Childs in this insightful episode featuring Evan Smith, a candidate running for Maryland's House of Delegates District 28. Evan shares his vision for transportation, environmental policies, labor rights, and opposition to corporate influence. 

Evan Smith:

• Campaign website

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

As someone who does not support data centers and you as well. Yes. Like you mentioned, you don't support them either. Do you see if they attached nuclear energy to data centers, would that be something that you would you would support them being being a cleaner source of electricity?

SPEAKER_01 0:18

It'd be a step in the right direction. It doesn't solve the issue for me. The what the energy generation is obviously the most visible concern. It's been the biggest thing that we've seen pushing our power bill sky high. But it hasn't been just addressing that alone doesn't address water usage, doesn't address noise pollution, doesn't address light pollution, doesn't address um environmental uh knock-on effects of how that just that pollution in that one area can cause things to be affected over a much wider radius. Further, I feel like the AI bubble is going to pop. It's like we already have data centers. Data centers are already a thing that have existed. It's the reason we see a push for them now is not because somehow we manifested twice the amount of people in the world to use the internet. It's we had it at saturation. The reason why is totally and fully AI. I don't believe that AI is everything it says to be, or even half of that. There's a lot of things that I could get into on that, but effectively I don't support AI and I also don't see it as a long-term part of the economy, really. It is something that has repeatedly had to be propped up by hype and investment and by forcing it everywhere, even when it may not be the best option available. All the AI companies are in bed with each other, just kind of cycling money around to make sure that their returns look pretty good. And so I think that even the need for data centers as a whole will probably decay like drastically as soon as AI kind of falls out of favor. Plus, the the one the one ideological conflict I've had as a part of this is that the electrical unions are very pro-data center, not necessarily pro AI, but pro-data center, because it gives their guys jobs. These are theoretically, these are good union jobs that are made in the course of building these things. But to them, I've had to say, okay, but once they're built, right, then what? Is you're not going to need nearly the same amount of guys to build to maintain the data centers as it took to build them. So you need to provide projects that are more long-term planning. The maintenance of a power plant is a lot more immediate and a lot more hands-on than data center. It's uh more obvious, it's not as depending on market forces to need to exist. And I would prefer to meet that need, that unmet need for employment, unionized employment, with constructing those renewable power sources. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:44

So as a as a future delegate, what would be your plan in the General Assembly to to address data s data centers? Would you do, would you support or or put up legislation to do an all right ban on new data centers? Would you look to put in explicit safeguards around them? What is the what is the the delegate Evan Smith play?

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Uh a little bit of all of the above. I feel like the reality is that you're fighting an uphill battle sometimes with a lot of these delegates that have been elected on the back of corporate money. And so I don't know that just me making my own little crusade crusade, as right as I might be, uh, is going to win over everybody to my side. So I think that the most viable strategy that I could put forward that I've thought about is trying to implement a temporary more moratorium until we can reasonably say that these things have been properly studied. Not just the energy study, which is supposed to conclude, I think, this September, but also this study on water usage, the study on noise pollution, the study on light pollution, all of these things, these also need to be taken into account. Air pollution as well, depending on how it's generating its power. But um, yeah, I would want to make sure that those studies are also uh made space for in the budget. Probably Governor Moore's gonna veto them again, but probably if I can get them passed, I can get them passed again. So yeah. It's been interesting to see that actually a couple of Republicans have broken from the Republican ranks in supporting this. Not that I'm suddenly now Republican, it's just been interesting to see. Like I think it was, oh gosh, what's his name? Todd Morgan, who represents the tip, southern tip of Calvert County and a little bit of St. Mary's. He actually is against data centers, which has been interesting to see.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

It's been a weird coalition of