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- Derek Weston via The Verge
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Kevin O'Leary's Utah Data Center Plan Draws Defamation Suit and Local Backlash
ReKevin O'Leary's Utah Data Center Plan Draws Defamation Suit and Local Backlash
A proposed 40,000-acre data center in Box Elder County, Utah, has sparked a defamation lawsuit against celebrity investor Kevin O'Leary and Fox News after he falsely linked local critics to China. The project, which would require a 9-gigawatt gas plant, has also angered residents who say they were kept in the dark.
Celebrity investor Kevin O'Leary and Fox News are facing a defamation lawsuit over on-air claims that linked local critics of his proposed Utah data center to the Chinese government. The suit, filed by Alliance for a Better Utah, Elevate Strategies, Gabrielle Finlayson, and Joshua Kanter, followed O'Leary's May appearance on Fox Business, where he alleged without evidence that online opposition to his project was orchestrated by China.
The project, called Wonder Valley, would sit on 40,000 acres north of the Great Salt Lake in rural Box Elder County. O'Leary has described it as the largest data center in the world, powered by a dedicated 9-gigawatt natural gas plant that would more than double Utah's average electricity consumption. The county commission unanimously approved the project in early May, a decision O'Leary touted as a sign that the United States is not «messing around» in its competition with China.
But the approval came after a rushed process that left many residents and even some local officials in the dark. County commissioners were officially notified of the project only five weeks before their vote. Rancher Tim Munns, who lives near the proposed site in Hansel Valley, said he first heard rumors when developers began approaching landowners. He drove to Salt Lake City to seek answers but found that neither state agencies nor his state senator, Scott Sandall, nor House Speaker Mike Schultz seemed to know anything.
O'Leary's on-air accusations against critics quickly unraveled. In late June, he posted a clarification stating he had no evidence that the named individuals or groups were funded by China or the Chinese Communist Party. Fox News also issued an apology, acknowledging it had no evidence to support the claims. Less than three weeks later, the defamation suit was filed. O'Leary and Fox moved to dismiss the case in late September.
The episode has exposed deep tensions over the rapid buildout of data center infrastructure in rural communities. Interviews with more than two dozen local officials and residents, along with thousands of pages of emails and text messages obtained through public records requests, reveal a project that moved with emergency-like urgency. Developers raced against rival speculators, O'Leary against competing projects, and Utah against other states, all while neglecting to inform the people who would live next to the facility.
For residents like Munns, the project represents a threat to a way of life. He bought his land 50 years ago because no one else wanted it, and he values the peace and quiet of the remote valley. When a developer called him, he recalled saying, «If you want to talk to me, it'll be at my kitchen table with my sons, looking me straight in the eye.» The lawsuit and the local anger suggest that O'Leary's attempt to cast critics as foreign agents has only deepened the conflict.
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