Why The US Is Building Massive Data Centers In UAE.
The United States and United Arab Emirates (UAE) have announced partnership to build a massive data center complex in Abu Dhabi to advance artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities with 5-gigawatts of capacity. The agreement, announced during the US President Donald Trump's recent visit to the UAE, will mark the largest data center deployment outside of the United States, according to the Commerce Department. The project is also expected to expand the footprint of American AI and cloud companies in the Middle East, allowing them to better serve the global south.
However, some key Senate Democrats have reportedly urged the Trump administration to revisit new artificial intelligence deals with Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. According to a report in Bloomberg, these Democrats say that the expanded sales of AI chips to the Middle Eastern countries risk exposing advanced technology to China and Russia, while potentially limiting supplies available for American companies. Incidentally, the US has restricted sales of advanced AI semiconductors to Saudi Arabia and the UAE since 2023, as part of a broader effort to prevent China from accessing banned American technology via intermediaries.
Now in a long post on Twitter, David O Sacks the 'White House AI and Crypto Czar', a newly-created role with the goal of building a legal framework for the cryptocurrency industry, defended Trump's AI data center partnership with UAE. He wrote that if the US does not take this deal, it will be Advantage China, which has been more than eager to offer Huawei+DeepSeek tech stack to UAE.
David Sacks wrote his post in response to Ro Khanna's address where he questioned partnership and asked: Why are we putting data centers and research hubs in Dubai? We should have those high-paying new technology jobs in the United States. What happened to 'America First'?
Quoting Ro Khanna, David Sacks wrote that 'some Democrats, including my friend Rep. Ro Khanna, are asking why we aren't putting the new AI data centers in Ohio and Pennsylvania. Actually we are doing that. The key to building new data centers is easier permitting and more power generation, both of which were effectively impossible under the Biden administration.' He added, 'The Trump administration is alleviating the bottlenecks. As the President says, we are going to 'Drill, Baby, Drill' — and we are also going to Build, Baby, Build. I hope Democrats will cooperate with us on this agenda; let's do it together for the betterment of the USA.'
As for doing it in UAE and not America, Sacks wrote, 'With respect to UAE, it's important to understand that the deal has a matching investment provision, so UAE will fund the build-out of AI infrastructure in the U.S. at least as large and powerful as that in UAE. And in UAE, the vast majority of the compute will be owned & operated by American cloud companies, to serve the region as well as the Global South. These are America First deals that drive investment into the U.S., improve our trade balance, and lock in American technology as the global standard.'
He went on to add that if the US does not take this deal, China will. 'The alternative is for the U.S. to reject the resource-rich Gulf States and drive them into the arms of China, which is eager to sell them a Huawei+DeepSeek tech stack. And China won't gainsay the opportunity by asking local partners why they aren't building their data centers in Beijing or Shanghai instead. China will just fill out the purchase orders and ship the chips, making Chinese technology the standard. We shouldn't let this happen. We still have a limited window to ensure American technology dominance in global AI infrastructure. Let's seize it.'
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