The first night kicked off at Pascal’s Rager, a house party in Washington, DC co-hosted by Micah Bock of the Department of Homeland Security and Madison Campbell, a tech influencer famous for her flame-throwing stunts and a following of 62,000 on X. The atmosphere was thick with vapor from roughly 500 cigarettes and a tray of Zyn nicotine pouches. Attendees included a handful of Trump-aligned officials and a cadre of women in sharply tailored Chanel-style jackets and ultra-short miniskirts, all speaking in accents that seemed oddly reminiscent of past campaign rhetoric.
Saturday’s “Data After Dark” party: celebrating compute amid controversy
The following evening, a second gathering was announced on X by Jonas Du, a writer for Pirate Wires. The flyer quoted, “In light of the bipartisan psychosis over AI data centers, it’s about time that the people who haven’t lost their minds get together and celebrate the glory of American compute.” The event—dubbed “Data After Dark”—quickly became a magnet for MAGA-aligned, Andreessen Horowitz-backed tech edgelords. Organizers highlighted that $64 billion worth of data-center projects have already been halted or delayed, citing concerns ranging from 5,000-gallon fuel spills to soaring electricity costs.
Casey Given, CEO of the libertarian nonprofit Young Voices explained that the party was meant to counter the “crazy apocalyptic” anti-AI narrative and to shift the Overton window toward techno-optimism. He noted that a single Virginia county has generated 1.1 billion dollars in tax revenue thanks to its data-center industry, now proudly called the “data center capital of the world.”
Activist perspective: Taylor Frazier McCollum takes the floor
With organizers’ permission, I brought Taylor Frazier McCollum, an emerging activist from Prince George’s County, Maryland, to the event. She arrived wearing a T-shirt that read, “If my mouth doesn’t say it, my face will.” The venue, PubKey—a bitcoin bar co-founded by crypto enthusiast Thomas Pacchia—was a flashier version of any typical club: men in crisp suits and caps emblazoned with “Let Data Reign,” women in silk dresses and kitten heels, a DJ looping footage of Tony Stark and Ana de Armas from Blade Runner 2049, and massive screens flashing blinking servers.
In a side room styled as a “whiskey bar” with leather couches and an American flag, we met Neeraja Deshpande, a conservative writer. She voiced concern that the national conversation often pits “growth and human flourishing” against one another. McCollum countered with concrete worries: she cited studies warning that Maryland could suffer rolling blackouts because of data-center electricity consumption, and she warned of local water contamination and polluted air. Deshpande suggested nuclear power as a clean solution, while McCollum argued that immediate access to clean water and affordable electricity mattered more than long-term projections. Their exchange remained courteous but highlighted a deep philosophical gap.
Speeches, protests and the night’s climax
When the clock struck ten, a series of short speeches began. A representative from a pro-AI political firm blamed the “Chinese” for painting AI as an energy-guzzling monster. Then Daniel Di Martino of the Manhattan Institute dismissed data-center skeptics as “crazy” and “Luddite,” concluding with the rallying cry, “the good guy with a gun beats the bad guy with a gun.“
Midway through, a suited protester burst onto the stage shouting about water usage. The crowd instantly erupted in a chant of “USA! USA! USA!” The atmosphere turned charged, and McCollum expressed her disapproval with a loud “Booooooo.” A blond man in front of her responded, “Are you booing or mooing? I can’t tell,” prompting laughter from his friends. Shortly after, McCollum excused herself and left the venue.
Aftermath and the road ahead
In the moments following her departure, conversations among attendees turned to the event’s lack of substantive discussion about data centers. One guest texted me at 2:30 a.m., noting, “There was notably NOTHING OF SUBSTANCE said about data centers today. Acute lack of specificity.” Despite the criticisms, the party exploded on X, and organizers announced plans for similar events in San Francisco, New York City, Miami, Austin, and Los Angeles. Micah Bock even extended an invitation to a “Deport-o-Ween” gathering next month, reminding us that the buzz around AI and compute shows no sign of fading.
