"Data Colonialism": Native Communities Fight AI Data Centers on Indigenous Land
Source: Democracy Now! · Bias: Far Left
Summary
The artificial intelligence industry’s data center boom is the latest chapter in a long history of environmental racism and resource exploitation in vulnerable Native communities, says Oglala Lakota and Northern Cheyenne activist Krystal Two Bulls, the executive director of Honor the Earth, an Indigenous-led environmental justice organization that is tracking over 100 proposed data center projects on tribal and rural lands. We speak to Two Bulls about the myriad impacts of what she calls a “modern-day iteration” of “settler colonialism,” including noise pollution, cancers and respiratory illnesses, water depletion, energy grid overload and even “ecological collapse.” As tech companies set their sights on Indigenous lands, Two Bulls says, “We’re always the one that ends up having to sacrifice our relationship to land, air, water, our communities and our nonhuman relatives.”
Related Coverage
- Wes Moore on democratic socialist gains: Voters want ‘someone who is going to fight for them’ (Center — The Hill News)
- Lawfare: Kangaroo court picks fight with state’s conservative attorney general (Far Right — WorldNetDaily)
- Birthright Citizenship Reopens the Fight Over Abortion (Far Right — The Gateway Pundit)
- The Rival Organizations Fighting to Shape America's 250th Birthday (Center — Bloomberg Politics)
- How the world's top AI models were revived (Center Left — Axios)
- AI Industry Is Creating a New Age of Imperial Extraction and Labor Exploitation (Far Left — Truthout)
- "Empire of AI": Karen Hao on How AI Is Threatening Democracy & Creating a New Colonial World (Far Left — Democracy Now!)
- To Reduce Electrical Grid Strain Amid Heat Wave, Data Centers Are Ordered to Use Backup Power (Center Left — NYT > U.S. > Politics)
Daily Analysis
Read the full Parallax Pulse for April 22, 2026 — an AI-powered analysis of how Left and Right media covered the biggest stories this day.
More Headlines From April 22, 2026
- US Navy chief leaving post 'effective immediately', Pentagon says (Center)
- Virginia court puts pause on voter-passed congressional maps boosting Democrats (Center Left)
- US Intercepts Iran Oil Supertankers as Tehran Keeps Hormuz Shut (Center)
- First Thing: ‘Impossible’ to reopen strait of Hormuz amid ‘flagrant’ ceasefire breaches, Iran says (Center Left)
- John Phelan out as Navy secretary in latest high-profile Trump admin. departure (Center)








