Month: May 2026

A group of rural Utah residents wants a chance to vote in November to oppose a massive AI data center development — the latest example of Americans resisting new data center projects over fears they’ll disrupt the environment and their communities.

The Utah project was approved by Box Elder County commissioners on Monday, despite protests from community members. Developers hope to begin early work on the site in the fall.

Backers of the data center, including Shark Tank investor Kevin O’Leary, say that the project will boost the local economy and that increasing America’s computing and energy production capacity is crucial for national security. But residents are calling for more time and more information to evaluate its impact on the already fragile local ecosystem.

The conflict is, in some ways, a microcosm of the larger AI debate. While wealthy builders make lofty promises about the technology’s benefits, many individuals worry about the consequences of the race to build a world-changing technology they may not want and have little say in.

“I love what technology can give us, but Big Tech has shown us that they are not accountable,” said Caroline Gleich, an environmental advocate and resident of nearby Park City, Utah. “It’s very concerning and difficult to be a proponent of this, with the amount of land, energy and the impacts to our communities, without guardrails, accountability and transparency.”

A group of Box Elder voters this week applied to add a referendum to the local ballot in November to overturn the county commission’s approval of the project, County Clerk Marla Young confirmed to CNN. The application, earlier reported by the Salt Lake Tribune, is now undergoing legal review and would need more than 5,000 signatures for the referendum to appear on the ballot.

Similar protests are occurring around the country, with some communities seeking to ban data centers. Developers are now scrambling to address those public concerns, fearing that a slowdown in progress could dent America’s competitiveness in AI.

“The potential of what we’re creating is so important for defense, for the economy,” O’Leary told CNN on Friday. “It should be, for everybody, a mission. We can’t let the Chinese beat us.”

Stratos Data Center Project

While development of the “Stratos Project” is expected to take place in phases over several years, the plan is to construct a 9-gigawatt AI data center and a natural gas plant to power it, as well as other potential facilities on the site.

The facilities will be built on a planned 40,000-acre campus on unincorporated land in northwest Utah dominated by ranching, farming and picturesque open space. Sitting just north of the already shrinking Great Salt Lake, the area is also a sanctuary for migratory birds. The county’s population is just over 65,000.

The project area comprises privately owned land — the owners of which have signed onto the project — as well as military and state-owned land, according to documents released by local officials. The project is backed by Utah’s Military Installation Development Authority, created by the Utah legislature to develop land in the state to support defense-related infrastructure.

Building a plant to power the data center is intended to ensure the project won’t strain the local grid and hike electricity costs for nearby residents, as has happened in other areas with AI data centers, O’Leary said.

He added that the facility would look to serve clients doing work on behalf of national defense, like the US government or tech firm contractors. The project is expected to support around 10,000 jobs in the construction phase and 2,000 permanent positions and provide tax revenue to the state and county, O’Leary said.

Utah Governor Spencer Cox, who has supported the project, said in a press conference last week that data centers are “important” but “not the No. 1 source of economic development for our state.” But he reiterated that their development is a national security priority.

“We have an obligation, I think every state has an obligation when it comes to this space, to allow for these types of data centers to be built,” he said.

Developers, who have already invested around $20 million, will seek letters of intent from potential data center tenants in the coming weeks. They’ll then pursue additional investment for the project, which could ultimately cost more than $100 billion, O’Leary said. The group hopes to have the first gigawatt of data center capacity operational within two years.

‘Will the jobs be worth the cost?’

For Utahns, the promised economic benefit is just one part of the calculus.

“The question is: Will the jobs be worth the cost?” said Robert Davies, a Utah State University physics professor and expert in environmental change. “One needs to think about, ‘What kind of community do I want my children and grandchildren in 30 years from now, 50 years from now?’ Because this thing, as described and running it for 30 years, will utterly transform this valley.”

Gleich also noted that the promise of jobs raises questions when tech leaders frequently warn that AI technology will displace human workers.

Some residents are concerned that the heat and emissions created by a 9-gigawatt data center — more than double the energy the entire state of Utah uses in a year — and a power plant could exacerbate the impacts of climate change in the area. And they worry that the water needed to cool the facilities could further drain the Great Salt Lake, leading to toxic dust that harms the health of people in the surrounding areas, including Gleich’s Park City.

“We keep hearing over and over again that we need to pray for rain,” because of the destruction of the Great Salt Lake, said Sarah Inskeep-Young, who lives in Salt Lake City and has family in Box Elder County. “And now this is coming. What does that mean to the whole state?”

Developers of the project say they will invest in new technologies to reduce the facility’s water usage and make it more power efficient, and that it will comply with federal and state environmental regulations.

O’Leary called worries about draining the lake “ridiculous” and said that as “a graduate of environmental studies, I know what’s on their mind, what they’re concerned about.”

But community members want to see independent studies.

“Let’s do an environmental impact study and let’s publish it transparently,” Gleich said. “Let’s get some things in writing, and let’s give the community some time to review them and give experts some time to review them.”

Inskeep-Young added: “What concerns me is the scale of the project compared to the amount of transparent public review.”

Protecting Utahns’ ‘birthright treasure’

The Box Elder County Commission unanimously voted to advance the project at a public meeting on Monday. The commission says it reviewed more than 2,500 public comments ahead of the decision.

But some residents say they feel the process was rushed and that they had little time to evaluate the project ahead of the meeting. Hundreds filed into Box Elder County fairgrounds to attend the Monday meeting — some to protest, some hoping for more details. Signs read: “Don’t sell us out” and “Streams over streaming.”

Davies, who was in attendance, said the “overwhelming sentiment was: we don’t have enough information.” (O’Leary claimed that paid protestors were bussed in for the event, something Davies and other community members have strongly disputed.)

“There was certainly plenty of shouting and even some profanity,” Davies said. “But you know what? One can understand it. This has the potential for massive impact to these communities and to … what we Utahns consider our birthright treasure, which is our landscapes.”

The meeting got so rowdy that one commissioner told the audience to “grow up,” and commissioners then retreated to a private room. Audience members watched as the approval was given via livestream to a screen in front of the room.

Explaining the decision, Box Elder County Commissioner Lee Perry passed the buck: “Our vote today is not a vote or against the data center — our vote is about personal property rights.”

A Utah Supreme Court justice has resigned amid a probe into an alleged relationship with an attorney who worked on a redistricting lawsuit.

Justice Diana Hagen appeared to reference the investigation and the toll it has taken on her loved ones in a resignation letter to Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, which was obtained by Fox News Digital.

“As a public servant for twenty-six years, I am keenly aware that public service requires sacrifice,” Hagen wrote. “I have willingly accepted those sacrifices for the privilege of holding a position of public trust, where I could do my part to uphold the rule of law and protect the constitutional rights of every Utahn.”

UTAH LEADERS LAUNCH PROBE INTO SUPREME COURT JUSTICE OVER ALLEGED RELATIONSHIP WITH REDISTRICTING LAWYER

Justice Diana Hagen is pictured in a courtroom of the Utah State Courts. (Utah State Courts)

“I also understand that public officials are rightly held to a higher standard and must accept a greater degree of public scrutiny and diminished privacy,” she said. “But my family and friends did not choose public life. They do not deserve to have intensely personal details surrounding the painful dissolution of my thirty-year marriage subjected to public scrutiny.”

The resignation was effective immediately, a spokesperson for Utah’s Administrative Office of the Courts said.

Hagen was accused by her former husband of sending “inappropriate” text messages to an attorney who helped challenge a Republican-friendly map that maintained four red congressional seats in Utah. David Reymann, who worked on behalf of progressive voting rights groups in the case, was named as the lawyer in a complaint that an attorney for Hagen’s husband submitted to Chief Justice Matthew Durrant and the Judicial Conduct Commission, according to local outlet KSL.

RED STATE JUDGE CHOOSES NEW CONGRESSIONAL MAP IN FIGHT THAT COULD RESHAPE HOUSE CONTROL

Hagen and Reymann previously denied the allegations.

The Judicial Conduct Commission—described on its website as an independent body comprising several state lawmakers, judges, and members of the public—conducted a preliminary investigation based on the complaint and chose not to pursue the matter further, KSL reported.

A statement issued by the Utah Supreme Court on behalf of Hagen in April said she took “prompt, prudent, and transparent steps” in response to the allegations by her ex-husband.

“My last involvement in the redistricting case was October 2024,” Hagen said. “I voluntarily recused myself from all cases involving Mr. Reymann in May 2025, and my recusal was reflected in the Court’s September 15, 2025, opinion in League of Women Voters.”

In her resignation letter, Hagen stated that she would love to continue serving on the bench.

The Scott M. Matheson Courthouse in Salt Lake City, Utah, houses the Utah Supreme Court and various lower courts. (Jim West/UCG/Universal Images Group)

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“But I cannot do so without sacrificing the privacy and well-being of those I care about and the effective functioning and independence of Utah’s judiciary,” she wrote.

Cox will be tasked with naming Hagen’s replacement. Fox News Digital has reached out to the governor’s office.

Fox News Digital’s Ashley Oliver contributed to this report.

A Utah couple have been accused of torturing their 11-year-old son to death, as a GoFundMe launched just days after the child’s passing said his family experienced an “unexpected passing.”

Brigham Merrell, 35, was booked Wednesday into the Box Elder County Jail on suspicion of child abuse homicide and child torture after allegedly calling 911 on September 21 to report seeing his “minor child hanging by a coaxial cable,” according to a Tremonton-Garland police affidavit cited by KSL. His wife, Melinda Merrell, 36, was also booked on suspicion of child torture.

During a months-long investigation, police said Brigham Merrell gave inconsistent accounts about who found the boy, the position he was in and the events leading up to his death, KSL reports. Investigators said those discrepancies, along with camera footage from inside the home, led to the couple’s arrests.

In a news release, police said that they will not identify the child who was killed “out of respect for the victim’s dignity.” Meanwhile, a GoFundMe campaign, created by user LaDaune Vonk, identified the child as Moroni and described his death as an “unexpected passing,” saying he was “prematurely taken from this earth” and asking for help covering funeral costs. The fundraiser had raised about $7,400 toward a $9,000 goal as of publication.

“If you didn’t get the chance to know Moroni, you would have found him to be extremely kind and loving with his 5 siblings,” the GoFundMe reads. “He loved to play video games and all things outdoors.”

“This has been a very devastating time for the Merrell family,” the fundraiser added.

However, police say the boy and his siblings, some of whom were home at the time of his death, endured prolonged abuse and disturbing punishments inside the home. One child told investigators they witnessed the victim die after receiving a “whooping” from Brigham Merrell, according to the affidavit seen by KLSN.

“During interviews with the children, friends of the children, the suspect and his wife, we also found yearslong allegations of child abuse and child torture, which included food restriction, admittance of corporal punishment that resulted in bruising when belts, pans and other items were used to whip, as well as allegations that the children are sent out to stay in an outside dog run when they are in trouble,” the affidavit states, per the outlet.

When Brigham Merrell called 911 on September 21, he claimed he was performing CPR on his son, but officers arrived to find him kneeling without providing aid, according to an affidavit. The child was later pronounced dead at a hospital after emergency responders treated him.

Investigators said home surveillance footage contradicted Merrell’s account. The camera footage is said to show him moving the child’s body through the house and past emergency responders attempting to access to property. He also left the room to change clothes during treatment, which police described as potentially concealing evidence.

After the incident, police reportedly learned that items had been discarded from the home, surfaces repainted and rooms altered.

A forensic exam found injuries and ligature marks inconsistent with hanging, along with bruising on the child’s back that may have occurred near the time of death. Both parents denied knowing the cause, though Brigham Merrell suggested it “could be from a belt.”

Melinda Merrell allegedly told investigators she checked her children for bruises days after whippings to “adjust their methods,” including switching from spoons to pans because the spoons left marks, police said. Both parents admitted to the abuse and stated they should have looked into the laws in Utah before they moved here. Melinda, specifically, stated she was not taught that leaving marks on her children was not acceptable,” according to the affidavit.

Video footage showed Melinda either participating in the beatings or watching as Brigham Merrell carried them out, investigators said.

The other children from the home have been placed in the care of child welfare agencies, KSL reports.

Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, known for initiatives on political civility and energy abundance, rolled out a new talking point this week in front of leading international business people in Washington, D.C., and Salt Lake City.

The Republican governor preached what could be described as a theory of community-centered capitalism.

Like any good conservative, Cox has long prioritized cultivating a corporate-friendly environment in Utah, complete with a six-year streak of cutting income taxes and a campaign to speed up government permits.

By key economic metrics, Utah’s free-market policy orientation appears to have paid off.

Utah has the highest year-over-year, and 10-year cumulative GDP growth in the country, the highest median household income adjusted for cost of living and the No. 1 economic outlook now 19 years running.

For three years in a row, U.S. News & World Report has ranked Utah as the best state. But, at high-profile events on Tuesday and Thursday, Cox didn’t point to the economy. The secret, he said, is what Utah’s economy is pointed to.

Utah is “a place where we still believe in community. A place where we still believe in faith and virtue and taking care of our neighbors,” Cox said. “A place where we believe that the economy works for us, and not us for the economy.”

Amid global turmoil, stability becomes a peculiar trait, and one that is increasingly attracting attention to Utah, Cox told the executives, diplomats and community leaders attending the annual Crossroads of the World summit.

As favorable views toward capitalism creep downward, and crash among young people, the unlikely answer coming from Cox is to remind capitalists what Utah never forgot: that business is at its best when it’s building community.

A moment of global uncertainty

Attendees at the two-day conference hosted by World Trade Center Utah and Zions Bank were greeted by a stark assessment of the world economy from Ian Bremmer, a political scientist and founder of the Eurasia Group.

Russian alienation, Chinese aggression and Middle East military action are shifting international relations as oil shortages, tariffs and artificial intelligence increase the odds of a global recession, Bremmer and others said.

Utah has seen positive movement as it navigates the tariff regime established by President Donald Trump, Zions’ senior economist Robert Spendlove said, with an increase in exports and a surge in technology imports from Taiwan.

But the dominant force in Utah and U.S. economies is uncertainty, Spendlove said, because it is too soon to tell what will be the long-term impacts of tariffs on prices and production, and of AI on efficiency and employment.

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Faced with these obstacles, businesses are looking for economic stability. But, more than that, Cox said business people, feeling “unmoored” and “unsettled” like they haven’t for “generations,” are looking for a stable life.

“The people across the globe are just desperate for goodness, for community, for connection,” Cox said. “So where in the world, where in the United States of America would you rather be than in the state of Utah?”

Cox said “Utah was in demand in a way that we have just never seen before” at the Select USA Investment Summit in Maryland on Tuesday, with international investors from Australia, Canada, Japan and South Korea lining up.

Utah’s competitive advantage is not its regulatory environment, Cox said, it’s a culture that encourages entrepreneurialism that gives back to “the least among us” — a capitalism of “neighborhoods,” not “boardrooms.”

This informs Cox’s approach to “pro-human” AI development. Concluding his remarks, the governor urged his audience not to lose sight of the fact that these technologies “work for us” so “we don’t become slaves to them.”

What are Utah’s unique values?

Cox’s idealistic message of business channeling humanity’s best values comes as Americans, especially young adults, have become more pessimistic toward the U.S. economic system than at any other point in recent history.

The share of Americans who view capitalism favorably fell to 54% in 2025, according to a Gallup survey. This is down 6 percentage points from 60% in 2021, and the lowest number since Gallup started asking the question in 2010.

A December YouGov/Economist poll found when asked to pick between capitalism and socialism, 41% of Americans chose capitalism and 21% chose socialism. That flipped among ages 18-29 to 26% capitalism and 28% socialism.

Some of this can be attributed to a feeling that capitalism has become unanchored from place and people, according to Ryan Beck, managing partner at Tapestry Capital, a Salt Lake City firm focused on long-term Utah investments.

“A relational approach to business means the lines between community and business get blurred in really profound ways that do create stability and that do share the gains of capitalism more broadly,” Beck told the Deseret News.

An example, Beck said, is the Larry H. Miller Company, which has poured resources into disadvantaged neighborhoods. But to maintain this culture, Utah must recognize “there’s certain money we don’t want in this state,” Beck said.

Money is not “the end goal,” Cox said on Tuesday; the real end is reflected in Utah having the best upward economic mobility in the country, correlated with the highest rates of two-parent homes, religious attendance and social capital.

Cox plans to build on Utah’s social capital, defined by family unity, charitable giving and neighborhood friendships, by leading a nationwide “America’s Potluck” initiative, inviting the country to share a communal meal on July 5.

President of Interfaith America Eboo Patel, who popularized the idea of potlucks as a metaphor — and a real-life practice — “to save diverse democracy” said a strong social fabric starts with crossing the street to have a conversation.

Strong communities are “the cornerstone for any civilization,” and require people to welcome diverse identities while striving to serve the common good with respect, relationships and cooperation, Patel said.

“There are too many people tempting us to look at the things we don’t like about one another,” he said. “Gov. Cox is one of the most important leaders inviting us to consider what we like about one another and how we can connect on that common ground.”