Kevin O'Leary had to walk back false accusations that locals fighting his Utah data center were funded by China — bad for him, and a sign of growing bipartisan backlash against data centers.

• O'Leary claimed on Fox News and Tucker Carlson that opposition to his Utah data center was secretly funded by the Chinese Communist Party, then retracted it with no evidence to back it up.
• Fox News issued multiple on-air apologies and corrections naming the activists he smeared.
• His project is still going ahead after a 3-0 county vote, but two of those commissioners were later voted out, and Utah's powerful state senate president lost his seat largely over the project.
• The fight is spreading: a lifelong conservative in Texas is backing a Democrat purely to stop a noisy local data center, and similar revolts are popping up in Tennessee.
• Opposition is driven by real worries about higher power bills, water use, and noise — not foreign meddling, and blaming China only makes residents angrier.

Outlook: Expect more politicians from both parties to turn against data centers as local anger keeps toppling incumbents who back them.