The quick read: • On Oct 10, Saturday Night Live's Weekend Update mocked investor Kevin O'Leary and his Stratos data center project in Box Elder County, Utah, The Salt Lake Tribune reported. • The real plan: up to 9 gigawatts of power at full build, more than twice what the rest of Utah uses, per The Christian Science Monitor. • On May 4, the three county commissioners left a public meeting after about 30 minutes of shouting and booing, moved to a separate room and voted 3 to 0 to advance the project, per KIVI. • On May 11, O'Leary told Fox News the project's opponents were "proxies for the Chinese government." On June 25 he posted that he had no evidence the two groups or the two people he named were funded by China, per KSL. • Those two people and their organizations sued O'Leary and Fox News for defamation on July 15 in federal court in Salt Lake City. • O'Leary's response: his motion to dismiss says "no reasonable viewer would take them as factual reports" and calls the remarks "argument and rhetorical hyperbole." He says the project means jobs and lets the U.S. compete with China in AI. In June he agreed to cut the project area from about 40,000 acres to about 20,000. The court has not ruled. • For a small business: the AI tools you rent run in buildings like this one. Who pays for the power and the water is being argued town by town. A Utah State University survey released Oct 5 found about 76% of Utahns surveyed oppose building more data centers in the state.
“SNL Roasted Kevin O'Leary's AI Data Center. The Real Plan Calls for More Than Double Utah's Electricity.”
who’s making the noise
Saturday Night Live, Weekend Update, Oct 10, 2026, as reported by The Salt Lake Tribune on Oct 11. Project facts from The Christian Science Monitor (Sept 1), KIVI (May 5) and KSL (June 4 and Sept 24). Survey from Utah State University (Oct 5).
our take
A comedy show made the Stratos project a national punchline on Saturday. We are not quoting the sketch. The record is strange enough without it: a project sized at more than twice a state's electricity use, approved from a side room after the commissioners walked out on the crowd, and a developer who went on television to call his critics proxies for a foreign government, then wrote that he had no evidence. O'Leary's side, stated fairly: he says the project brings jobs and helps the U.S. compete with China in AI. In June he agreed to halve the project area, keep about half of what remains as open space, farmland or habitat, and use water-saving technology. Fox apologized on air. In court he argues his remarks were hyperbole that no reasonable viewer would take as factual. We take all of that as reported. It is also a defense that asks a judge to find he should not have been believed. Status matters here. The project is proposed, not built. As of Sept 24, KSL reported it appeared to be on hold while a separate lawsuit from opponents moves through Utah state court. Half of the original site is still larger than Manhattan, which is about 14,600 acres. The plain move for a small business: ask the AI vendors you depend on where your workloads run and whether your price is tied to their power costs. If a data center is proposed near you, the Utah survey says what residents want most is a say in the decision. Go to the meeting and ask who pays for the grid upgrades and the water. What to watch: the judge's ruling on the motions to dismiss, the state court case, and whether Stratos moves ahead with its permits.