China is accelerating its push to build the data centers and power networks needed to fuel artificial intelligence, a rapid expansion that is drawing fresh attention in Washington. While the United States still holds a major advantage in the physical backbone of the AI boom, Beijing’s ability to deliver enormous infrastructure projects at speed has raised questions about how quickly that gap could narrow.

For now, America’s lead remains substantial. The Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence’s 2026 AI Index, citing Cloudscene data, reported 5,427 data centers in the U.S. in 2025, compared with 449 in China. Stanford noted, however, that the figures do not reflect key differences such as facility size, computing power or how intensively the sites are used.

Still, the pace of China’s buildout is difficult to ignore.

“We know that China is far behind, but we also know that they are moving at great speed,” China expert Gordon Chang told News Media.

Chang argued that Beijing understands the U.S. advantage will be difficult to erase if America continues building at the same pace and said growing opposition to data-center development could slow that expansion.

President Donald Trump made a similar argument this week, warning communities fighting new projects that China stands to benefit.

“China could not be happier with this anti Data Center movement,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “Actually, they can’t believe it is happening!” Trump also argued that communities embracing data centers would gain jobs and tax revenues.

Vice President JD Vance sharpened that warning Thursday, telling Fox Business there was “a very good chance” the U.S. could lose the AI race to China if Democrats regain control of Congress.

Vance said the broader problem is America’s ability to build enough power to support data centers and other major infrastructure. “We cannot be a country that says we’re not going to build more power,” Vance said, arguing that the administration is trying to make it easier to construct power plants alongside data centers while protecting residential ratepayers from higher electricity costs.

He also pointed to the widening US-China electricity gap, saying China now generates roughly three times as much power as the United States. “We’ve got to build more power plants. We’ve got to make the regulatory state easier to work with.”

Asked about China’s rapid infrastructure expansion, the Chinese Embassy in Washington rejected the premise that AI should primarily be viewed as a geopolitical contest.

“AI should not be owned by major countries, still less dominated by contests and rivalry,” Embassy spokesperson Liu Chang told News Media.

Liu pointed to China’s 2025 Global AI Governance Action Plan, which calls for accelerating construction of clean power, next-generation networks, computing capacity and data centers. He said China advocates cooperation with the U.S. and wants AI development to benefit both countries and the broader international community.

Behind that diplomatic message, Beijing is undertaking a massive geographic reorganization of its computing infrastructure.

Under China’s “East Data, West Computing” initiative, Beijing is directing more computing capacity toward western regions where land is available and wind and solar resources can help reduce energy costs.

Five of China’s eight national computing hubs are located in western China, according to a June 25 report from the government-backed Digital China initiative. More than 30 data centers were under construction within a three-kilometer area in Horinger, Inner Mongolia, while intensive construction was also underway in Zhongwei, Ningxia.

That buildout caught the attention of members of the bipartisan US-China Economic and Security Review Commission during a recent fact-finding trip to China.

“I left with an intense belief that the Chinese see this as the frontier in terms of competition,” Commission Vice Chairman Mike Kuiken told News Media, describing AI as increasingly intertwined with robotics, biotechnology, advanced materials and manufacturing.

Kuiken said China has one significant advantage when it comes to constructing the infrastructure needed to support that technology.

“The Chinese, because they write the rules as they go, and the rule of law largely does not exist, are able to just move faster in terms of building things,” he said.

But Kuiken also identified a major Chinese weakness: access to the most advanced chips.

“The constraints that are real though, the Chinese do not have the ability to procure advanced chips,” he said, while describing Beijing’s ability to rapidly construct coal plants and other infrastructure as “quite incredible.”

The U.S. retains major advantages beyond its data-center lead. The Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence’s 2026 AI Index found that America produced 59 notable AI models in 2025 compared with 35 from China, and U.S. private AI investment reached $285.9 billion, compared with $12.4 billion in China. Stanford cautioned that private investment figures understate Beijing’s overall spending because of Chinese government-backed funds.

At the same time, Chinese models have rapidly narrowed the performance gap. Stanford’s 2026 AI Index found that as of March 2026, the top U.S. model led the top Chinese model by just 2.7%.

Chang also alleged that Beijing is seeking to exploit American opposition to data centers and claimed China-linked networks have helped support protests against projects in the US. “These protests are not entirely organic,” Chang told News Media.

Kuiken was cautious about portraying those local disputes as part of a broader anti-China fight, saying genuine U.S. opposition to data-center projects has also emerged over concerns including electricity costs, water use, noise and land development.

“We are building things in the U.S. faster than we have in a long time,” he said, adding that policymakers are working through infrastructure constraints. “Usually there are local issues that are driving those things.”

The emerging competition, therefore, is not simply over who develops the smartest AI model.

It is increasingly a race over who can build the electricity, data centers, chips and networks needed to run those models at enormous scale — and how quickly they can build them.

As jury deliberations in the Lindsay Clancy trial stretch into a sixth day in Massachusetts, attention has shifted from the courtroom arguments to an unexpected detail on her wheelchair — one that some legal observers say may prove unhelpful.

A pink sticker bearing the phrase “#sidebah” was photographed this week on the drink holder attached to Clancy’s wheelchair by the court’s official photographer.

The wording appears to play off the way Clancy’s attorney, Kevin Reddington, pronounces “sidebar” in his Boston accent. The phrase has since taken on a life of its own online, circulating as a satirical meme among people following the trial.

Sidebars — private bench conferences between the judge and attorneys that are not heard by jurors or the public — have been a frequent feature of the highly charged proceedings, with prosecutors and the defense repeatedly clashing with Judge William Sullivan.

Outside court on Thursday, supporters of Clancy told the Daily Mail they viewed the sticker as a lighthearted nod to Reddington, who has become a prominent figure among those backing the accused child murderer during the case.

But California legal analyst Neama Rahmani, who is not involved in the trial, warned the sticker could be interpreted as Clancy making light of the proceedings. 

Florida-based attorney Andrea Lewis agreed and said the sticker could affect the deadlocked jury’s thinking if they were to see it.

‘A trial about the deaths of three children is not the place for jokes. A sticker may seem insignificant, but jurors see everything and may view that as a sign that she is not taking the trial seriously. That is an enormous risk to take when your life is literally on the line,’ Lewis said.

The panel of nine women and three men has been unable to reach a unanimous verdict after 36 hours of deliberations. There appears to be an 11-1 split among jurors. 

Clancy is accused of murdering her three children by strangling them with exercise bands in January 2023. She has admitted to the killings but insists she is not guilty of murder because she was in the grip of severe postpartum psychosis at the time.

She is now paralyzed from the waist down after having jumped from her second-story bedroom in an apparent suicide attempt immediately after the killings.

Tara Mill, 59, a nursing assistant from Plymouth, Massachusetts, who was outside court on Thursday supporting Clancy, explained the origin of the #sidebah meme.

‘Oh, it’s kind of a joke, because of Reddington, him saying “I really don’t want to go to the sidebah”. So people are making memes out of that,’ Mill said.

Mill added that she had seen the phrase repeatedly on TikTok.

The phrase appears to have first emerged online in 2024 during the high-profile Karen Read murder trial, which was also held in Massachusetts, but its usage has been particularly widespread in recent months amid the global fascination with Clancy’s case.

Caryn Marshall, 52, a labor and delivery nurse and mother who lives in Duxbury, where the killings took place at the Clancy family home, was also outside court on Thursday.

She described Reddington as something of an unlikely folk hero.

‘He’s a really good, intelligent, old school lawyer. Like, they don’t make him like that anymore. He’s amazing to watch. Yeah, you a class confidence and He’s a gentleman. He’s a gentleman first,’ she said.

‘I think everyone should have a Kevin in their corner. That would be my hashtag, Kevin in my corner.’

But many social media critics aren’t seeing the funny side.

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‘Lindsay Clancy has the audacity to put a “joke” sticker “SideBah” on her drink holder?!?!!! Does she think that’s all a joke?!’ one X user wrote.

An aggrieved Reddit user called the sticker ‘absolutely disgusting’.

Lewis, a former prosecutor, told the Daily Mail: ‘Jurors see everything. They notice how a defendant is dressed, her body language, her facial expressions, who she interacts with, and whether she smiles or laughs at a moment that may seem inappropriate. 

‘That scrutiny is particularly intense in a case like this, where the allegations are so disturbing and Lindsay Clancy is sitting just feet away from the jury.

‘Something as small as a sticker may seem insignificant outside the courtroom, but inside it, there really are no small details. Fairly or unfairly, jurors are constantly observing the Lindsay and forming impressions from everything they see.’

Rahmani, a former prosecutor and defense attorney, said he ultimately believed the sticker was ‘harmless’ and unlikely to sway jurors either way.

‘It’s a local Massachusetts jury, so I don’t think a wheelchair sticker is going to move the needle one way or another and get these jurors to come around and reach a verdict. I think we’re marching towards the very high likelihood of a mistrial,’ he said.

This comes as tensions have boiled over amid a verdict deadlock, with one holdout juror accused of failing to follow the law. 

On Thursday, a note from the jury foreperson was given to Judge William Sullivan claiming that one of the twelve is not following the law as it pertains to reasonable doubt. 

That development prompted Clancy’s lawyer to request the holdout juror be thrown off the trial. Sullivan denied that request and sent the deadlocked jury home for the evening.

But Rahmani warned that if the case were to end in a mistrial and be retried, prosecutors could potentially use the wheelchair sticker to argue Clancy was not taking the proceedings seriously.

‘You could potentially raise it in opening or closing: she’s not taking it seriously, she thinks this is a joke. That definitely happens a lot. I have used that argument,’ Rahmani said.

He added that such an argument could also be relevant to a judge when determining a sentence, if a defendant appeared not to have sincerely accepted responsibility.

Clancy has appeared largely stone-faced throughout proceedings, but broke down several times during testimony and as graphic evidence was presented to the jury.

Rahmani said: ‘If I were her attorney, I would not want her to make light of the proceedings at all.’

He praised Reddington’s performance in the trial, saying the defense had far exceeded his expectations.

Rahmani said that before the trial he had viewed the case as a ‘layup’ for prosecutors, given how rarely insanity defenses succeed. 

‘I was interviewed about this case weeks before trial, and I said that this would be a layup for the prosecution. As the case progressed, when the closings and the summations finished, I predicted either a not criminally responsible [verdict] or a hung jury. That’s how well the defense has done in this case,’ he said.

‘You play with the hand that you’re dealt [as a defense attorney]. And this was a very difficult hand: three dead children under the age of five.’

Jury deliberations will continue Friday.

New York City’s Administration for Children’s Services deserves one thing: consistency.

For years, the agency has argued that “systemic racism” is the core problem undermining its work. Now, under Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s newly released citywide Racial Equity Plan, ACS is leaning even harder into that claim.

The trouble is that agency leaders have yet to produce solid evidence backing that diagnosis — while the solutions being promoted risk leaving more children, regardless of race, exposed to serious harm.

The plan, released Tuesday, states that “racism and biases” against black and Hispanic families “influence the reports made to the Statewide Central Register,” arguing that racial disparities appear “at the earliest stages of child welfare contact.”

Its proof? Last year, black and Hispanic families accounted for 36.1% and 46.2% of SCR intakes, respectively, while white children represented 6.3% and Asian children 3.6%.

But the fact that black kids are reported at higher rates is not prima facie evidence of racism: Black children are more than twice as likely nationwide to be the victims of maltreatment as their white peers and 12 times as likely as Asian children.

Nationwide, black children die as a result of abuse and neglect at more than three times the rate of white children.

In other words, one would expect families to be reported for abuse and neglect at higher rates if they actually are abusing and neglecting (not to mention killing) their children at higher rates.

In response to these disparities, ACS proposes to make race and ethnicity a central focus of its function, by classifying cases finely and releasing more data disaggregated by race.

The one piece of information it doesn’t intend to disaggregate by race is data on child victims of abuse and neglect.

Moreover, the agency’s extensive list of “Racial Equity Goals” includes not a single mention of lowering child maltreatment rates.

Reducing racial inequity trumps reducing abuse and neglect every time.

The plan says: “There are many instances where a family is reported to the state unnecessarily . . . as a child is not in danger of maltreatment, and the family would be better served by supportive services or concrete resources rather than a child protection response.”

How many instances? It gives no answer — but the agency is nevertheless committed to reducing these reports.

ACS will promote “a citywide culture shift among mandated reporters” — teachers, nurses, cops and others — “from ‘when in doubt, call the SCR’ to ‘you can support a family without having to report a family,’ when a child is not in danger of maltreatment.”

But as the spate of tragic deaths in families known to ACS has shown, the agency seems to have no idea when a child is in danger of maltreatment.

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By 2034, ACS pledges also to “ensure that more than 30% of cases are diverted to the CARES program,” its “non-investigatory” child-protection pathway.

It calls CARES “a core strategy for combating racial disparity and promoting social justice . . . by shifting low-to-moderate risk cases away from a traditional investigation to a collaborative and less intrusive response for families.”

But again, it’s not clear that ACS knows which cases are low-risk.

Meanwhile, by telling teachers and others not to report problems like chronic absenteeism, or kids coming to school hungry or without being bathed, ACS is blinding itself to kids in danger.

These are often signs of serious dysfunction in a family, commonly resulting from addiction or untreated mental illness

By suppressing reports, ACS cannot make proper decisions about when a family needs intervention.

Instead, ACS plans to give families more “concrete supports.”

They want to open more Family Enrichment Centers, for instance, stocked with resources like laundry facilities.

Yet parents engaged in chronic abuse or neglect of their children are unlikely to voluntarily walk into an FEC — and free washing machines won’t stop their behavior.

Finally, ACS’s goals for the city’s juvenile-justice population, of which it’s also in charge, are equally wrongheaded.

The agency promises to strengthen “restorative justice” practices in secure detention facilities — that is, have perpetrators sit down with the victims of their crimes to talk it out, instead of imposing real consequences.

Again, the purpose of this ACS plan is to reduce racial disparities in punishment; that’s why the agency nowhere acknowledges that restorative-justice techniques are ineffective in reducing recidivism.

Indeed, over the last half-decade when these tactics have been employed, juvenile recidivism in the city is either up or stable.

ACS has been plagued by woke and ineffective policies for years now.

Now it has a mayor who is equally committed to them.

Naomi Schaefer Riley is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

The U.S. Coast Guard seized more than a ton of suspected marijuana valued at over $2.4 million after crews stopped a suspicious high-speed vessel during a patrol, military officials said.

According to Joint Interagency Task Force South, crews later recovered 47 bales along the boat’s suspected route. The packages weighed a combined 2,082 pounds.

Four people were detained following the interdiction, JIATF-S said.

Officials said the operation began as a routine patrol when the crew of the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Escanaba spotted what they described as “a suspicious go-fast vessel” and deployed a boat crew to take a closer look.

“The vessel stopped without further incident,” JIATF-S said.

During follow-on operations, Coast Guard crews discovered what officials described as a “bale field” along the vessel’s prior track and recovered the suspected marijuana, valued at more than $2.4 million.

“This mission required vigilance, professionalism, and seamless coordination from detection and pursuit to evidence recovery and search-and-rescue support,” JIATF-S said.

JIATF-S did not specify where the incident took place, but thanked the Coast Guard Cutter Escanaba and Joint Rescue Coordination Center Haiti for their “timely support, search assistance, and coordination throughout the operation.”

The drug seizure comes amid the Trump administration’s ongoing campaign targeting narcotics trafficking networks in the Western Hemisphere.

U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) touted the operation, saying the “bust is another demonstration of the United States’ resolve to stop the flow of dangerous drugs into the homeland.”

This week, SOUTHCOM said it conducted two operations in which U.S. forces intercepted and sank vessels in the Eastern Pacific that the military said were tied to Los Choneros, which it described as a violent narco-terrorist organization.

The U.S. military has also been involved in a monthslong campaign launched by the Trump administration aimed at dismantling cartel-linked trafficking networks, including dozens of strikes in the Eastern Pacific and Caribbean targeting vessels it says are connected to “narco-terrorists.”

The latest seizure follows another major Coast Guard drug bust off the coast of Puerto Rico last month.

The Coast Guard intercepted a suspected smuggling boat nearly 50 miles off the coast of the U.S. territory and discovered more than 7,000 pounds of cocaine worth about $54.5 million.

Five people aboard the suspected smuggling vessel were detained and taken into custody as part of that investigation.