For a long time, most Americans knew little about their local data center. These server farms have long been the invisible but critical backbone of the internet, rarely drawing interest from anyone outside the tech industry and certainly not becoming a captivating political issue. As of 2025, those days are officially over.
Over the past twelve months, data centers have inspired protests in dozens of states, as regional activists combat America’s ever-increasing compute buildup. According to Data Center Watch, an organization tracking anti-data center activism, there are currently 142 different activist groups across 24 states organizing against data center developments.
Activists have a variety of concerns. These include the environmental and potential health impacts of these projects, the controversial ways in which AI is being used, and, most importantly, the fact that so many new additions to America’s power grid may be driving up local electricity bills.
This sudden populist uprising appears to be a natural response to an industry that has grown so quickly it is now showing up in people’s backyards. As the AI industry has swelled to dizzying heights, so too has the cloud computing business. Recent U.S. Census Bureau data shows that since 2021, construction spending on data centers has skyrocketed a stunning 331%. Spending on these projects totals in the hundreds of billions of dollars. So many new data centers have been proposed recently that many experts believe a majority of them will not, and indeed could not possibly, be built.
This buildout shows no signs of slowing down. Major tech giants, including Google, Meta, Microsoft, and Amazon, have all announced significant capital expenditure projections for the new year, a majority of which will likely go toward such projects.
New AI infrastructure is not just being pushed by Silicon Valley but by Washington, D.C., where the Trump administration has made artificial intelligence a central plank of its agenda. The Stargate Project, announced in January, set the stage for 2025’s massive AI infrastructure buildout by heralding a supposed “re-industrialization of the United States.”
In the process of scaling itself exponentially, an industry that once had little public exposure has suddenly been thrust into the limelight and is now suffering backlash. Danny Cendejas, an activist with the nonprofit MediaJustice, has been personally involved in a number of actions against data centers, including a protest in Memphis, Tennessee, earlier this year where locals decried the expansion of Colossus, a project from Elon Musk’s startup, xAI.
Cendejas meets new people every week who express interest in organizing against a data center in their community. He stated that he does not think this is going to stop anytime soon, and that it will keep building, leading to more wins and more projects being stopped.
Evidence in support of this assessment is widespread. Across the country, communities have reacted to newly announced server farms with intense opposition. In Michigan, where developers are currently eyeing 16 different locations for potential data center construction, protesters recently descended upon the state’s capitol, declaring that Michiganders do not want data centers in their yards or communities.
Meanwhile, in Wisconsin, another development hot spot, angry locals appear to have recently dissuaded Microsoft from using their town as a headquarters for a new 244-acre data center. In Southern California, the tiny city of Imperial Valley recently filed a lawsuit to overturn its county’s approval of a data center project, citing environmental concerns.
The discontent has grown so intense that politicians believe it could make or break particular candidates at the ballot box. In November, it was reported that rising electricity costs, which many believe are being driven by the AI boom, could become a critical issue that determines the 2026 midterm elections.
Cendejas noted that the connection to rising energy bills is what has made this issue so stark for people, as many struggle month to month while witnessing a huge expansion of data centers. People are questioning where the money is coming from and why local governments are giving away subsidies and public funds to incentivize these projects when there is so much need in their communities.
In some cases, protests appear to be working and even halting, if only temporarily, planned developments. Data Center Watch claims that some 64 billion dollars worth of developments have been blocked or delayed as a result of grassroots opposition. Cendejas is a believer that organized action can halt companies in their tracks, stating that all this public pressure is working and that he senses a very palpable anger around the issue.
Unsurprisingly, the tech industry is fighting back. A relatively new trade group, the National Artificial Intelligence Association, has been distributing talking points to members of Congress and organizing local data center field trips to better pitch voters on their value. Tech companies, including Meta, have been taking out ad campaigns to sell voters on the economic benefits of data centers.
In short, the tech industry’s AI hopes are pegged to a compute buildout of epic proportions. For now, it is safe to say that in 2026 the server surge will continue, as will the backlash and polarization that surround it.