Americans Love AI But Oppose Data Centers That Power It
Left 50%
Center 0%
Right 50%
1 left · 0 center · 1 right
What happened
Polling in 2025 showed a split between AI use and support for its infrastructure: Morning Consult found more than half of Americans used an AI chatbot in July, while a May Gallup poll found 70 percent opposed constructing AI data centers in their communities. President Donald Trump pressed communities to accept the facilities, writing on Truth Social that the only reason not to want them is if they want to end up "backwards and poor," and saying at a White House event that he would "absolutely want" a data center as a mayor or governor because of jobs and tax revenue, though the industry might need "a little public relations help"; the White House said he wants centers built only in communities that want them and is requiring operators to pay for their own power, water, and other utilities. His administration has moved to speed deployment with an executive order creating a fast-track permitting regime, directions for the Energy Department to identify federal lands for siting and for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to consider new grid-interconnection rules, and an Environmental Protection Agency proposal to eliminate federal notice-and-comment requirements for certain "minor" air-pollution permits that can include data-center backup generators. Local and state pushback has already altered projects: Hood County, Texas, where Trump won more than 80 percent of the 2024 vote, revoked a previously approved concept plan for an 862-acre facility known as Fort Spunky that sought 100 megawatts of electricity and up to 20,000 gallons of water a day, with a projected peak construction workforce of 2,000 but only 200 permanent jobs; Pennsylvania Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro imposed tougher transparency and local-approval rules; and Texas Republican Gov. Greg Abbott issued two data-center directives and a temporary pause on development.
Omitted — what each side leaves out
Unpacked
Americans' fight over where to put AI's physical plants is the story in left-leaning coverage and does not appear in right-leaning coverage. Left-leaning coverage, in Business Insider, treats community resistance to data centers as the boom's core political problem, citing Trump's warning that holdouts will end up being "backwards and poor." Right-leaning coverage never names data centers, water use, or local project votes, and instead treats the public problem as distrust of AI and a contest with China.
Left-leaning coverage opens on noisy sprawl and midterm races. Right-leaning coverage opens on the claim that more than three-quarters of Americans do not trust AI or its builders.
If towns keep blocking the sites, who pays for the electricity AI still consumes on the same grid?
Bottom line
Business Insider puts a Gallup finding that 70 percent of Americans oppose nearby AI data centers at the center of the boom; the Washington Examiner's AI strategy piece never mentions data centers.
The receipts — 6 facts one side's coverage lacks
- 70 percent of Americans oppose constructing data centers for artificial intelligence in their community, per a Gallup poll from May
- A senior White House official said polling is not necessarily great on data centers and that they have become a big midterm topic
- Texas Gov. Greg Abbott issued two data center directives and a temporary pause on development amid opposition
- Hood County, Texas, commissioners revoked a previously approved concept plan for the Fort Spunky data center
- A proposed Hood County data center projected a peak construction workforce of 2,000 and a permanent workforce of 200
- The Trump administration is preparing a new executive order to provide national security guardrails for AI
The Left View
Left-leaning coverage presents the use-versus-siting gap as a midterm liability for both parties, especially for Trump given his "full-throated embrace" of data centers, and treats opposition as a response to "real material costs and political realities" rather than a communications failure. Ben Green of the University of Michigan said the industry has "really overplayed their hand," citing electricity rates, water use, and sparse permanent employment; Mike Madrid, a Republican consultant, said he sees "no political downside" for politicians who oppose the facilities, which have become a "tangible target" for broader anxiety about technological change, concentrated wealth, and corporate data collection. Stephanie Justice of Americans for Responsible Innovation argued that "using AI and wanting its infrastructure built responsibly, and people wanting to have a voice, aren't opposites," while Green cautioned that regular use is not the same as support because workers are often "pressured to become fluent in AI." Coverage notes governors in both parties reversing course after constituent pressure, environmental groups' worry that the EPA permit change will make nearby projects harder to contest, and a senior White House official's acknowledgment that "polling isn't necessarily great on data centers" even as the administration argues national-security competition with China.
The Right View
Right-leaning commentary, in a Washington Examiner opinion by Alliance for a Better Future CEO Janet Kelly, frames the problem as a trust and governance crisis around AI itself: "more than three-quarters of Americans simply do not trust AI or its builders," in part because the technology "feels like yet another technology nobody asked for" after social media and because "Silicon Valley's values are often at odds with those of everyday Americans." Kelly rejects "a wave of doomerism" that would stop the technology, hand it to Washington, or "wait for Europe to write the rules," arguing instead that American AI "has to earn trust" with guardrails "written by Americans, for Americans" and "has to win around the world" against China, which is "running hard with no intention of playing fair." She compares the task to cars, medicine, aviation, and President Kennedy's moon program — build and iterate with discipline rather than outlaw or stall — and calls for protections for children and the elderly, private financial data, AI agents "kept on a leash," and "a hard commitment that this technology creates work rather than erasing it." She writes that President Trump "understands the stakes" as his administration prepares a national-security executive order with "the right instincts: leverage the good, lower the risks."
Our Take (balanced)
The left's strongest argument is that community resistance is grounded in measurable local burdens — power and water demand, landscape change, and permanent job counts far below construction peaks, as in the Hood County proposal — and is already moving governors and county boards of both parties, which undercuts the claim that better public relations would suffice. The right's strongest argument is that public distrust, however real, cannot be allowed to cede a dual-use general-purpose technology to a geopolitical rival, and that historically the United States paired continued deployment with American-set safety rules rather than a halt. The central unresolved tension is that the same public that consumes AI tools largely refuses to host the plants that make them run, so national-security and growth claims collide with concentrated local costs neither side has shown how to allocate.
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