Washington is back to its familiar balancing act this week, weighing innovation against oversight as technology policy debates stretch from Capitol Hill to statehouses and overseas regulators. From federal AI deployments and platform accountability to energy strains from data centers and a closely watched hearing, the latest developments show how quickly tech decisions are colliding with governance, infrastructure, and public trust. Here is what policy professionals should be tracking as the week unfolds.

In this week’s Nimitz Tech:

• TikTok and EU regulation: Europe is drawing a hard line on social media, warning TikTok that its core design features may violate online safety laws by promoting compulsive use.

• Federal AI expansion under Trump: A White House push has driven a rapid expansion of AI across federal agencies, embedding the technology in policing, health care, and defense.

• State data center moratoriums: A growing number of states are moving to pause data center development as lawmakers grapple with the energy and environmental costs of the AI boom.

WHO’S HAVING EVENTS THIS WEEK?

Tuesday, February 10th

• Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation: “We Interrupt This Program: Media Ownership in the Digital Age” at 10:00am. Watch here.

Wednesday, February 11th

• House Education and Workforce: “Building an AI-Ready America: Safer Workplaces Through Smarter Technology” at 10:15am. Watch here.

• House Science, Space, and Technology: “Accelerating Progress: U.S. Surface Transportation Research” at 2:00pm. Watch here.

TECH NEWS DRIVING THE WEEK

In Washington

• The Trump administration has sharply accelerated the adoption of artificial intelligence across the federal government, directing agencies to deploy the technology widely and remove barriers that could slow its use. A Washington Post analysis of agency disclosures found nearly 3,000 active AI applications by the end of 2025, many of them classified as high impact and used in sensitive areas such as law enforcement, immigration enforcement, health care and national security. Agencies including the Department of Homeland Security, the FBI and the Department of Veterans Affairs are using AI for tasks ranging from facial recognition and investigative lead generation to predicting suicide risk and streamlining benefits claims. While the White House argues that AI will make government more efficient, experts warn that the rapid rollout may come at the expense of safeguards, transparency and oversight, raising concerns about errors, bias and potential harm to individual rights.

National

• More than 800 Google employees have petitioned company leadership to disclose and end its cloud services for U.S. immigration agencies, condemning what they describe as violent, “paramilitary-style” enforcement actions that they believe Google technology may be enabling. The protest erupted after the killing of Alex Pretti by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis and reflects a broader revival of employee activism in Silicon Valley following years of tightened corporate controls and relative quiet. Workers are calling for transparency around Google’s contracts with agencies like ICE and Customs and Border Protection, safeguards for employee safety, and clarity on whether the company allows its A.I. tools to be used in immigration enforcement. While Google says its services involve commercially available cloud infrastructure, employees argue that the lack of visibility creates serious ethical concerns, echoing earlier internal revolts over military and government contracts and invoking the company’s long-faded “Don’t be evil” ethos.

• A new reliability assessment from the North American Electric Reliability Corp. warns that U.S. electricity demand is rising far faster than the infrastructure and generation needed to support it, driven largely by the rapid growth of energy intensive data centers. NERC forecasts a 24 percent increase in peak electricity demand over the next decade, with data centers accounting for most of the growth, while delays in interconnecting new resources and ongoing generator retirements increase reliability risks in several regions. Industry groups say the findings highlight policy failures rather than technical limits, pointing to slow grid interconnection processes, restrictive state siting and permitting rules, and misaligned market signals as barriers to adding new capacity quickly enough. The report has renewed calls for regulatory and market reforms to speed resource development, expand transmission, and ensure that policies governing power markets, permitting and planning keep pace with technology driven load growth.

• New York lawmakers have introduced legislation that would impose a three year moratorium on new data center development, making the state at least the sixth to consider a pause amid growing bipartisan concern over the rapid expansion of data centers tied to artificial intelligence. Similar bills have recently been introduced in states including Georgia, Maryland, Oklahoma, Vermont and Virginia, reflecting worries about impacts on electric grids, energy prices, water use and the environment. Supporters say the pause would give regulators time to study data center effects and propose new rules to protect communities and ratepayers, while critics argue it could slow economic development. The New York bill would require state agencies to assess environmental and public impacts during the moratorium and recommend regulatory changes before permitting resumes.

International

• European Union regulators issued a preliminary decision finding that TikTok’s design features, including infinite scroll, auto-play and personalized recommendation algorithms, may violate E.U. online safety laws by encouraging compulsive use, particularly among children and vulnerable users. The European Commission said these features pose potential risks to users’ physical and mental well-being and could require TikTok to change core aspects of its platform or face fines of up to 6 percent of its global revenue under the Digital Services Act. TikTok said it would challenge the findings, calling them inaccurate, but the case marks the first time regulators have formally applied a legal standard to assess social media addictiveness. The investigation reflects growing global scrutiny of social media platforms over their impact on young users and their responsibility for user safety.

• Elon Musk’s SpaceX has restricted Russian troops’ access to Starlink satellite internet in Ukraine after a request from the Ukrainian government, disrupting a system Russian forces had been using illicitly through smuggled equipment. Russian military bloggers reported widespread outages affecting frontline communications and some drone operations, though analysts said the full impact on Russia’s war effort remains uncertain. Ukrainian officials said Russia’s use of Starlink had expanded in recent months, including for drones, prompting Kyiv to push for tighter controls. Under the new measures, Starlink access in Ukraine is limited to terminals registered and verified by the government, effectively blocking unauthorized Russian devices but also temporarily disrupting some Ukrainian users still undergoing registration.

Just for Fun

State Fairs: Growing American Craft is the first major exhibition to survey the art, craft, and cultural traditions of American state fairs, bringing together more than 240 works that reflect personal stories, regional identities, and the social life of fairgrounds from the nineteenth century to today. Viewable at the Renwick Gallery at the SAAM.

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