Reporting the Backlash

The midterms pushed data centers center stage, as media, activists, and politicians questioned AI’s ever-expanding infrastructure.

From the Midwest to the Deep South, debate over data centers ahead of the midterms galvanized a populist wave of opposition. Americans are “now more likely to oppose candidates who are pro–data center construction, a reversal from ten months ago when these candidates would get slight support,” according to a recent Politico poll conducted by PF Global. Roughly two-thirds of Democrats and about half of Republicans said they would be “not too or not at all comfortable with a new local data center,” according to a recent Pew Research Center survey. The anxiety didn’t come out of nowhere: between March and August, the number of planned and operating projects nearly tripled. Alex Brown, a reporter who covers energy infrastructure across the United States for Stateline, which covers state policies and politics, told me that there’s lots of precedent for people “showing up to local government meetings, putting things on the ballot.” What’s new is the pace of data center construction “and the fact that there are so many communities facing these questions at the same time.” That meant, he said, that voters “were inspired by seeing pushback in another community.”