Democrats won control of the House and Senate in yesterday's midterm elections, giving the party subpoena power and a platform to investigate the technology industry after two years in which the Trump administration largely declined to police it. The results put congressional oversight of Big Tech back in play even with Trump still in the White House, and they reshaped several races in which the industry's infrastructure was already a campaign issue.
The Republican losses included seats that had been considered long shots or effectively out of reach six months earlier. Texas elected a Democratic senator and a Democratic governor. While Trump remains president, Democrats will be empowered to launch investigations, bring technology executives before hearings and negotiate over budget and defense bills, and the results carry implications for the 2028 presidential race.
The administration's approach had favored the industry. It declined to enforce a divest-or-ban law against TikTok, a law Trump himself had originally proposed, and TikTok thanked Trump by name inside its app. A Republican-led Congress proved too divided to pass the tech regulations it wanted, and the Justice Department and Federal Trade Commission slowed the wave of high-profile investigations seen under the Biden administration and the first Trump administration. Tech executives attended Trump's inauguration, companies gave donations and gifts, the White House hosted the unveiling of OpenAI's Stargate Project data center plan, the Army formed a detachment for executives from Meta, Palantir, OpenAI and Thinking Machines Lab, and Trump named tech leaders as advisers. He also ordered a technology renamed because he believed it would improve the AI industry's image.
Public anger toward the industry has grown. Hyperscale data centers became a flashpoint in numerous midterm races, and concern about AI is high. The source article identifies several lines of inquiry for lawmakers: a $24.5 million legal settlement by Google that the company denies was a bribe, Trump's financial ties to the cryptocurrency industry and a pullback on crypto fraud investigations, and Elon Musk's financial benefits from his relationship with Trump along with his actions at DOGE.
Data center opposition has largely been organized at the local level, and newly elected state Democrats are expected to sustain it. With many Republicans also opposed to hyperscale centers, Democrats could pursue federal legislation and force Trump to defend his pro-data-center position by vetoing it, and they can block his effort to override local rules. Trump's preferred moratorium on state AI laws, which Republicans tried repeatedly to move through Congress, appears finished.
The article also notes the risk that lawmakers repeat the past decade of tech reform and pass almost nothing, citing the repeated failure of antitrust overhauls and a data privacy framework despite bipartisan support. It warns Democrats against mirroring Republican attacks on the industry under Biden, when Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio used committee powers to accuse social media platforms of censorship, and points to FCC chair Brendan Carr as an example of administration figures whose conduct has drawn concern from some Republicans.
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