Both parties now run against data centers, and the details differ

Data center projects are now a campaign issue in congressional and gubernatorial races across the country, according to a Verge report published today. In Pennsylvania, 64 percent of likely voters in an early October Quinnipiac poll said AI data centers would do more harm than good. In Florida, 59 percent of likely voters in an October NBC6/Telemundo poll opposed data centers in their own communities. Candidates in both parties are responding, and the responses are not identical.

Same target, different remedies

The pattern in the report is that rhetoric has hardened even where candidates once courted these projects. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro announced a $20 billion Amazon investment last year, then in August signed an executive order banning nondisclosure agreements for data center developers and took AI data center proposals off the state's fast-track permitting. His Republican challenger, Stacy Garrity, called rural Pennsylvania "perfect places to put data centers" in a radio interview last year and now supports a pause of no more than three years, according to Spotlight PA. In Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott celebrated a $40 billion Google investment last year, then announced an audit in August that could slow new grid connections.

The remedies fall into three buckets. Cost-shifting: require data centers to pay for the power and infrastructure they use. Texas Senate candidates Ken Paxton and James Talarico both want this, as does Florida's Byron Donalds. Incentive repeal: end sales tax exemptions, which both Texas Senate candidates also back. Pauses: a moratorium on new construction, backed by candidates including Florida's David Jolly (one year on hyperscale facilities), Texas's Gina Hinojosa, and Michigan Senate candidates Mike Rogers (one year) and Abdul El-Sayed.

Why electricity is the pressure point

A large data center is a "large load" customer: it draws power on the scale of a small city. Utilities must build generation and transmission to serve it, and those costs can land on ordinary ratepayers unless regulators assign them to the customer. That is why "pay for what you use" appears in nearly every plan. It is also why a pause is a blunt substitute: it stops projects while the cost-allocation rules are still being written. Ohio's Ratepayer Protection Act, introduced by Sen. Jon Husted, would have made large-load customers cover their own energy costs and grid upgrades. It passed the House and narrowly failed in the Senate.

The Playbook

If you build, lease, or depend on data center capacity, assume the rules in your target states are unsettled through the election and after it. Sensible moves for the next month:

• Map exposure by state. List every planned site or capacity contract in Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan, and note which are pending permits versus already approved.
• Model the cost-shifting scenario. Nearly every candidate in the report wants developers to fund their own power. Price your projects as if that becomes law.
• Stress-test incentives. Where a project's economics lean on sales tax exemptions, treat them as revocable.
• Drop the confidentiality reflex. Pennsylvania has already barred NDAs for developers. Plan community engagement before a hostile campaign does it for you.

The mistake would be to treat the backlash as one policy or wait for a winner. Candidates of both parties have reversed positions within a year, so a promise today is weak evidence of a rule tomorrow.

Questions You Should Be Asking

• If our project's economics break when we pay full grid-upgrade costs, was the business case ever about the data center or about someone else absorbing the bill?
• Which of our permits or interconnection approvals could be paused, audited, or pulled from fast-track, as Texas and Pennsylvania have begun doing?
• Do our contracts with customers allocate the risk if a state moratorium delays delivery, and who pays?
• What have we promised host communities, and could we defend it in a campaign ad?
• If a Republican leaning toward local control and a Democrat leaning toward a pause both squeeze us, which state's rules are we actually betting on?

What To Watch Next

Watch Ohio. A leaked Republican Senate committee memo warned that if Husted loses and data centers get the blame, politicians nationwide will avoid backing the next project. The Cook Political Report rates that race a toss-up. A Husted loss would likely be read as proof that data center support costs votes, and the policy response would harden accordingly.