Gov. Jeff Landry joined Hut 8 executives and Donald Trump Jr. — son of President Donald Trump — on Monday at a groundbreaking event for the company's $10 billion River Bend data center in West Feliciana Parish.
At the event, Trump Jr. introduced Landry, calling him "a truly great friend" and praising his efforts to bring data centers to Louisiana despite the "vilification" of the projects across the country.
“Just to be able to be here to support a friend who I truly believe has an incredible opportunity to do something for Louisiana, to take advantage of some of the insanity around the rest of the country and say, ' Bring us those businesses,'” Trump Jr. said.
The groundbreaking comes just over three months after a company tied to Hut 8, the partner of the Trump brothers in a bitcoin mining venture, donated to a political action committee (PAC) affiliated with Gov. Jeff Landry.
In March 2025, Hut 8 Corp. launched American Bitcoin with Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr., who joined a group of investors in the venture. Eric Trump is the company's chief strategy officer. Hut 8 CEO Asher Genoot sits on American Bitcoin's board.
In August, at the SpaceX announcement, when the Gulf States newsroom asked Landry about the Hut 8 data center, he said he didn't "know about that one.”
Campaign finance records, however, show that US Data Mining Group Inc., a company that merged with Hut 8 in 2023 and shares the same Miami address as American Bitcoin Corp., gave $25,000 to Cajun PAC II, Landry's political action committee, on June 24.
Gautier Lemyze-Young, Hut 8’s communications director, confirmed in a statement that US Data Mining Group, which does business as US Bitcoin Corp., is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hut 8 Corp., and the company “engages in the political process on issues relevant to our business and the communities where we operate.”
“Political contributions are separate from our project negotiations and commercial decisions,” Lemyze-Young wrote.
‘Landry changed that’
Landry said the project's first phase will bring up to $10 billion in investment, about 1,000 construction jobs and 268 permanent jobs, plus $60 million toward local water infrastructure. Hut 8 said the originally announced 265-job estimate included both direct and indirect employment.
"This is not a data center. This is a digital factory," Landry told the crowd.
At the groundbreaking event, Hut 8 CEO Asher Genoot credited Landry with solving the project's biggest obstacle — the company nearly lost the project because it didn't yet have the power it needed.
"Gov. Landry changed that," Genoot said, adding that the governor made sure power was available when the project needed it.
Hut 8 signed a 15-year, $7 billion lease with Fluidstack for 245 megawatts of capacity. Genoot said the company sees River Bend as "the first" campus in Louisiana, with plans to build more. He also said Landry invited company officials on a hunt and the warden at Angola invited them to the prison rodeo.
Robert Hogan, an LSU political science professor who studies elections, parties and interest groups, said he sees nothing unusual or illegal about the contribution. Large businesses commonly pair such donations with other tools, such as hiring local lobbyists.
Because Landry has made clear Louisiana is open to data centers, Hogan said, it isn't surprising that aligned companies would give ahead of statewide elections.
"I would be surprised if a company whose business model involves building data centers in states was not contributing to the political funds controlled by governors friendly and receptive to the company's interests," Hogan said.
Hogan acknowledged some might see a problem and ask whether the company bought the governor's help or was rewarding it. A gift of that size is unlikely to change a public official's position, he said, though it could help "around the edges" with access or getting calls returned.
Still, he said, such exchanges have a cost.
"I think it does undermine public trust in elected leaders," Hogan said.
Cajun PAC II raised $377,500 and spent $209,578 in June. Louisiana Illuminator’s Julie O'Donoghue reported in 2025 that the state Board of Ethics told the PAC to stop paying for the governor's congressional gym membership, and that lawmakers later changed the law at Landry's urging to allow such expenses.
Since the change, Landry has used the PAC for purchases including hunting gear, Christmas gifts, and expenses related to travel to Greenland, where he serves as President Trump's special envoy.
NDAs and federal connections
Hut 8's River Bend data center in West Feliciana Parish stands out from other new large industrial projects in that local officials never signed nondisclosure agreements (NDAs).
The Gulf States Newsroom first reported the Landry administration’s widespread use of the agreements to keep negotiations around industrial developments hidden from the public.
In an interview, West Feliciana Parish President Kenny Havard told the Gulf States Newsroom that neither the company nor Louisiana Economic Development (LED) — the state agency focused on attracting businesses — asked parish officials to sign an NDA. Hut 8 said in its statement that its local agreements were negotiated directly with the parish, without an NDA, through established public processes.
LED did sign an NDA with Anthropic, the artificial intelligence company behind the Claude AI model and an anticipated tenant of the Hut 8 data center, in September 2025. West Feliciana officials did not.
“We're proud that we did it without having to sign NDAs,” Havard said. “And I think it just shows that you can do these projects without keeping the people in the dark.”
The parish sold land to a developer that later sold it to Hut 8, Havard said, which then bought adjacent parcels, and the parish negotiated its own payment-in-lieu-of-taxes (PILOT) agreement in public meetings and posted the details online.
Hut 8 said that it expects to use the state's sales and use tax rebate for data center equipment — originally created to entice Meta for its data center in Richland Parish — and the Quality Jobs program. The company said it has engaged with LED on established incentive programs, and that participation is subject to eligibility, approval and compliance requirements.
Havard described in general terms how power gets arranged for large projects in Louisiana.
"Entergy and LED together decide where the winners and losers are going to be," he said, referring to the utility and the state economic development agency. Hut 8 paid for the substation, Havard said, and the lines connecting the site to a nearby nuclear plant.
Havard also raised concerns about who pays for the power.
"We can't continue to build data centers and then put it on the rate payers," he said, adding that Louisiana should consider a separate rate class for data centers.
Entergy said in a statement that power for the River Bend project was committed through its standard interconnection process. The utility said that for any large economic development project, it coordinates closely with partners such as Louisiana Economic Development and the Governor’s Office.
Fluidstack is expected to be a tenant along with Anthropic, though Havard said he hasn't spoken with either and has dealt only with Hut 8. Anthropic confirmed it is the expected tenant.
Anthropic has been in a legal fight with the Trump administration since February, when Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth designated it a national security supply-chain risk after it refused to allow its AI to be used for mass domestic surveillance or fully autonomous weapons, according to the Congressional Research Service. The Defense Department says it has stopped using Anthropic's products, according to a recent BBC report.
Separately, the Wall Street Journal reported in September that Fluidstack is in talks with the Pentagon for a $5 billion loan to finance AI infrastructure. The report doesn't say which project would be financed. Fluidstack has agreements with Hut 8 and other former bitcoin miners.
This story was produced by the Gulf States Newsroom, a collaboration between Mississippi Public Broadcasting, WBHM in Alabama, WWNO and WRKF in Louisiana and NPR.
