Data centres become a flashpoint on US midterm election day as local opposition grows

Data centres become a midterm issue

Data centres have moved from a niche planning question to a central theme of the US midterm campaign, with voters casting ballots on 3 November 2026. Coverage published that day describes the issue as cutting across party lines, tied to electricity bills, water use and jobs. Opposition is also described as a proxy for other local disputes, and residents in Ohio and California voice similar anger about costs. The growth is driven by the global AI race, which has pushed communities to resist energy-hungry facilities.

Power bills and water in Ohio

In New Albany, Ohio, about fifteen companies, including Amazon, Google and Meta, operate 40 data centres, and 28 more are under construction or planned. Noah Satish Malik, an engineer and member of the Save Ohio Parks association, said water and electricity rates have risen for residents. He also said state and local officials had granted the firms large tax breaks, and city authorities did not respond to requests for comment.

Operating40

Under construction or planned28

Operating

40 count

Under construction or planned

28 count

Data from the article text

Malik said the area once offered cheap utilities that drew the companies in.

“Before, we could access water and electricity at relatively attractive prices.”

A 445-hectare site near Mount Orab

Further south-west, in Mount Orab, a town of about 5,000 residents, a proposed mega-site covers 445 hectares and is designed for 2,000 megawatts of demand. Jessica Adams Baker, who leads the citizens' initiative Conserve Ohio, said the investment runs to several billion dollars. The developer, DB Stu LLC, is registered in Delaware, and the mayor has signed a confidentiality agreement that keeps the end user unnamed. Residents assume the buyer is Meta, because leaked contract passages resemble those of other Meta data centres. Baker said the anger is intense because the companies are acting quietly.

Bay Area moratoriums and developer responses

At least seven Bay Area cities, including San Francisco and Richmond, passed temporary moratoriums on data centre construction in the final two months before the vote. Oakland passed its moratorium on 6 October after days of protest outside City Hall, where demonstrators dressed as cardboard robots. Carlos Gutierrez, an activist with Communities for a Better Environment, tied the protests to rising power prices.

“Power prices have gone up so much in Oakland that some people are thinking of shutting off their power.”

Gutierrez also said the city was planning to supply power to a data centre.

Counts and developer responses

Pew Research Center counts more than 3,000 data centres operating in the United States, with more than 1,500 in development. A separate global tally puts the US figure above 5,000 and the worldwide figure above 13,000, and the articles do not reconcile the two. In Ireland, an estimated 135 data centres are reported, and 23% of electricity is said to go to them, the highest per-capita share in the world. In California, developers propose the Los Angeles Recreation and Technology Park on golf courses, arguing that replacing fairways would save water and create jobs. None of the articles reports results from the 3 November vote.