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Happy Tuesday.
Two attacks on one house in three days.
An FBI raid in Texas. Attempted murder charges. And a 13-page policy paper nobody read in time.
Coffee up.…
The Big Sip
The AI backlash just turned violent.
Sam Altman's San Francisco home was attacked twice in three days — first a Molotov cocktail, then gunfire. The FBI raided the first suspect's Texas home on Monday and filed attempted murder charges.
Watch what comes next:
The suspect had a hit list of AI executives and their home addresses.
Sponsor Break
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Here’s Your Brew
The timeline is loaded.
On April 6, two things landed:
A New Yorker investigation into Altman by Ronan Farrow, and OpenAI's own 13-page policy paper calling for a robot tax, a public wealth fund, and a four-day workweek.
A New Deal for the AI age — written by the company making the old one precarious.
Four days later, a 20-year-old from Texas threw a petrol bomb at Altman's front gate.
The suspect, 20-year-old Daniel Moreno-Gama, carried a 23-page manifesto arguing AI will cause human extinction. Court documents show he posted 34 messages in the PauseAI Discord server over two years. He had a list of other AI executives and their home addresses. This wasn't random rage.
It was planned and ideological.
Two days later, a second incident at the same house.
A car pulled up, and someone opened fire. Police arrested two suspects with firearms in the vehicle, though their motive is still unclear. Separately in Indiana, someone shot at a city councillor's home over a data centre vote. The note left behind: "No data centres."
Different actors, different grievances — but the temperature is rising in the same direction.
All of this lands in a country where AI polls worse than ICE.
An NBC survey from March found just 26% of voters view AI positively — net favourability of minus 20. The only things less popular: the Democratic Party and Iran. OpenAI can publish all the policy papers it wants.
The gap between "we'll build a wealth fund" and "someone is at my gate with a lighter" keeps widening.
Two Sides, One Mug
Pro: Violence discredits legitimate AI criticism and hands the industry a sympathy card it didn't earn.
Con: When a $380 billion company proposes the safety net, it also gets to design the trapdoor — and the backlash reflects people who sense exactly this.
Our read: The fear is real. The manifesto is unhinged. When public anger skips the ballot box for the front gate, the policy conversation is already too late.
Receipt of the Day
1,000 registered voters surveyed. 57% said AI's risks outweigh the benefits. Net favourability: minus 20.
Why it matters: This is the majority position — and it was measured before someone threw a Molotov cocktail at the industry's most visible face.
Spit Take
AI is less popular than ICE, Trump, and Stephen Colbert. — NBC News, March 2026
Extra Curricular Coffee Break Links
SF Standard — Is the AI backlash getting dangerous? — Tech executives quietly upgrading security as anti-AI rhetoric turns physical.
SF Standard — OpenAI's New Deal paper, explained — Robot tax, wealth fund, four-day week. The blueprint nobody read before the fire.
TechCrunch — Altman responds to the New Yorker and the Molotov on the same day — Two very different kinds of incendiary.
Mugshot Poll 📊
The AI backlash has gone from tweets to attacks. What fixes it?
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Enjoy your Tuesday, keep it caffeinated.
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