China-Tied Marxist Group Fueled Maryland Data Center Moratorium

A single mother's petition against a $5 billion data center in Landover, Maryland grew from 180 signatures to more than 20,000 after a Marxist-Leninist group tied to a China-based tech mogul promoted her campaign — and Prince George's County responded with a two-year ban on data center development.

Taylor Frazier McCollum has been credited as a grassroots activist who helped secure the moratorium. Reporting from Influence Watch and the Anti-Defamation League now shows her campaign received extensive support from the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), a San Francisco-based organization connected to Neville Roy Singham's pro-China Marxist network.

Who backed the Landover campaign?

The PSL promoted McCollum's petition, supplied demonstration signs bearing its logo, and published a dozen videos of her activism since September 2025. Its D.C. chapter posted the first video in September 2025, three months after McCollum launched her petition in June 2025. In it, McCollum explained her petition and accused the developers of "environmental racism." The video drew hundreds of thousands of views, and signatures surged from 180 to more than 20,000.

A week later, on September 8, 2025, the PSL posted another video in which McCollum invited residents to rally outside a Prince George's County public meeting. Days after, the organization published footage of protesters carrying signs with the official PSL logo, including one that declared, "Stop big tech's war on black communities." The PSL account wrote: "The message is clear, the people don't want data centers and AI destroying their communities!"

McCollum's organization, No Landover Data, has continued distributing flyers displaying the PSL logo. One flyer claims data centers are "raising our power bills" and "allow ICE to terrorize our communities."

The takeaway: what looked like a spontaneous local campaign had institutional muscle behind it from the start.

What is the PSL's connection to China?

Influence Watch and a recent Anti-Defamation League report describe the PSL as funded by, and sharing personnel with, Neville Roy Singham's $100 million pro-China Marxist network of activist organizations. Influence Watch identified overlap involving the ANSWER Coalition, BreakThrough News, and the People's Forum.

Singham is a Shanghai-based, avowed Marxist multimillionaire and expatriate accused of financing a broad Chinese propaganda network. Critics say he has bankrolled anti-American, pro-CCP nonprofits to the tune of $278 million. City Journal reported in June that the PSL occupies a central role in the network, citing a communist funder who said Singham's organizations "redirect insurgent organizing into tightly controlled institutions."

The PSL's activity extends well beyond data centers. Over the past year it has led dozens of demonstrations in D.C., protesting the Trump administration, the Iran war, the capture of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro, and ICE.

The stakes are national: anti-data center organizing is becoming more successful, and at least part of it traces back to funders tied to Beijing.

What did the platform investigations find?

X's Global Government Affairs team reported in August that its safety team had uncovered Chinese inauthentic accounts repeatedly distributing content opposing data centers. Their statement was specific:

"We identified a bot farm of approximately 200,000 accounts. Within this farm, we found 200 accounts posting in a manner that could manipulate a legitimate debate about American AI and energy policy. These posts contained claims that AI data centers are driving up household electricity prices and straining the grid. Others included AI-generated cartoons that depicted data-center operators enriching themselves at the public's expense."

The team added: "We remain committed to maintaining an open and authentic platform where people debate topics of public interest. We take seriously any attempts to undermine the integrity of the global town square and suspend accounts that violate our Authenticity policy."

An investigation published earlier this year by the Bitcoin Policy Institute connected several other anti-data center campaigns to organizations tied to the Chinese government. President Donald Trump has also suggested China is behind the movement. Commentator Sam Lyman summarized the argument on X: "Singham's political foot soldiers have been boots on the ground in dozens of anti-data center fights across the country. But striking down the $5 billion data center campus in Landover, MD, was by far their biggest scalp."

In plain terms: both platform evidence and funding research point the same direction — coordinated, China-linked amplification of local opposition.

What happened to the $5 billion project?

McCollum's June 2025 petition asked county officials to stop a proposed $5 billion data center planned for the site of a Landover mall abandoned since 2002. An NPR profile reported that McCollum and her daughter were evicted from their apartment in 2024, stayed for a time at her grandfather's house, and were still searching for a home.

The Prince George's County Council approved a measure in July prohibiting data center development for two years, at least temporarily blocking the Landover project. Critics note the county faces a $155 million budget shortfall. The PSL's latest video of McCollum appeared in June and showed her demanding a permanent prohibition: "We want a ban. Full stop."

McCollum has since taken her campaign to a wider stage. She spoke at the "People Over Data Centers" summit in Baltimore, organized by the Chesapeake Climate Action Network and featuring Rep. Jamie Raskin (D., Md.), joining a panel of four activists who won fights against major technology companies over data centers.

What is Washington doing about it?

Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.), chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, has called for a federal investigation. His demand followed growing scrutiny of the organizations and online accounts pushing opposition to data center projects nationwide.

McCollum's appearances in PSL content also extend beyond data centers. In January, the group posted a video of her criticizing D.C. youth detention centers. In April, it featured her speaking at an anti-Iran war protest surrounded by Palestinian flags, where she said: "Trump and his war criminal buddies are telling us that this war is over, but at what cost? We need a new system that puts people first and puts people over profits. Stand up and fight back and join the socialist movement."

With a federal probe on the table and platform investigators documenting coordinated inauthentic activity, the question of who funds local opposition to American AI infrastructure is now squarely before Congress — and the Landover moratorium is the case study everyone will cite.