Business mogul Kevin O’Leary said late Wednesday he is willing to scale back his controversial 40,000-acre artificial intelligence data center campus in Utah after mounting backlash over the development’s size and environmental impact.

The “Shark Tank” investor told NBC News he is “going to have to” slim down the development amid political pushback from state leadership. 

“I have no choice,” he said at the Washington AI Network’s AI Honors gala.

Utah Senate President J. Stuart Adams (R) sent a letter to O’Leary on Monday calling for a 75 percent reduction in the size of the proposed Stratos data center in Box Elder County, from an already approved 40,000 acres to about 10,000 acres.

Adams also requested “greater transparency, stronger conservation commitments and enhanced protections for Utah’s natural resources,” including protections for the Great Salt Lake, despite none of the water currently used in the area flowing into the lake.

O’Leary suggested the request was driven by political reasons amid growing opposition to the project, which has sparked protests and criticism from residents who argue the development advanced without sufficient public input.

“I know he did it for political reasons,” O’Leary told NBC News. “He has to address those issues, and so do I.”

The state senator is running for reelection against two challengers in an upcoming June 23 GOP primary.

O’Leary said he plans to send a formal response to Adams with details of a revised proposal by Friday.

The Stratos project in the Beehive State has become a closely watched data center development due to growing debate over the massive energy and water demands of large-scale data centers. 

It has been billed as one of the world’s largest AI data center developments and was approved to span multiple sites across the state.

O’Leary has previously dismissed concerns as “misinformation” and lies, notably accusing China of funding smear campaigns against the project.

“All these people have a right to get information,” he said. “Why are they getting it from a false initiative? Who is spending all this money to put out all these falsehoods and straight-out misinformation and lies and agitate these people?”

O’Leary also told NBC News he suspected one of the major organizations pushing back on the development, Alliance for a Better Utah, is funded by dark-money interests from China. The organization denied the claim, writing: “The only foreign interest in this data center is Kevin from Canada,” in a statement on its website.