Texas, Ohio and Georgia data-center plans face a policy test after midterms

The three states hold more than 40% of planned U.S. data-center capacity

Texas, Ohio and Georgia together account for more than 40% of all planned data-center capacity, and all three states saw strong voter pushback against data centers and artificial intelligence in the recent midterm elections, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Voters in the three states swung hard to the left in the elections, according to the Journal’s report, flipping governor seats and helping Democrats win back the House and Senate.

The results leave investors and AI companies waiting to see what kind of policies the newly elected Democrats will enact to curtail upcoming data-center construction projects, the Journal reported.

Those projects approached $100 billion in private spending as of September, according to the report. Analysts project U.S. tech companies plan to spend trillions of dollars on the AI build-out in years to come.

The Journal’s report examined potential data-center legislation in what it described as the states at the center of the AI boom, and what such legislation means for the U.S. economy.

The officials elected to govern Texas, Ohio and Georgia — which together hold more than 40% of planned data-center capacity — won elections in which voters registered strong pushback against data centers and artificial intelligence.

The report was produced by Noah Higgins-Dunn, a New York-based video journalist for the Journal whose work focuses on economics, politics and corporate affairs.

What the newly elected Democrats in Texas, Ohio and Georgia enact — and whether the AI boom slows in the three states that together hold more than 40% of planned data-center capacity — remains unresolved. Investors and AI companies are waiting to see, the Journal reported.