61% of Americans Now Want Data Centers Stopped.

• THE GRID

A leaked memo hit Axios last week. The National Republican Senatorial Committee warned AI companies that data centers have become a "sleeper issue" for the 2026 midterms.

Not tariffs. Not jobs. Data centers.

The memo was blunt. Attacks on data center projects are working better than standard campaign ads. In several races, the issue is landing harder than anything else on the air.

I didn't see this one coming. Then I looked at the polls and the construction data. They tell the same story from opposite ends.

Penn's Annenberg Public Policy Center surveyed Americans in June and July. Sixty-one percent now oppose new data centers near them. That's up 12 points from spring. The anger crosses every line — 69% of Democrats, 54% of Republicans, 53% of independents. Support has dropped to just 14%.

A year ago, most Americans had no strong view on data centers. Now they do.

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Google has said publicly that some of its new data center sites face transmission connection delays of up to 12 years. Twelve. That's not a permitting problem. That's a physics problem. You can't move electrons on wires that don't exist yet.

And building them is slow. The median project entering the interconnection queue today takes five years to reach commercial operation. Nearly 80% of projects that enter the queue never finish. They withdraw — usually because the upgrade costs have become prohibitive, sometimes reaching 30 to 37 percent of total project budgets.

The PJM capacity market tells the story in dollar terms. One auction ballooned from $2.2 billion to $14.7 billion in a single year. That cost lands on ratepayers. A Carnegie Mellon study projects an 8 percent average increase in U.S. electricity bills by 2030 — and over 25 percent in the highest-demand pockets of Virginia.

Data center spending rose 57% last year — $27.3 billion in new work. Every other nonresidential category fell 7.9% year over year. The rest of construction lost more than data centers gained.

The boom isn't lifting all boats. It is the only boat.

Utility forecasts assume massive load growth. Valuations assume permits clear. Pipeline projections assume projects get built. Three hundred twenty-one moratoriums say: not so fast.

In Ohio, a Senate race is now a referendum on who pays for data center power. In Pennsylvania, the governor imposed new rules after years of wooing the industry. This isn't one state. It's a pattern.

November is seven weeks away. Construction data says boom. Poll data says stop.

When 61% of voters oppose what 10% of the construction economy depends on, something breaks. I don't think it'll be the voters.

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• RESISTANCE

Two years ago, Jon Husted called data centers "a tremendous economic opportunity for Ohioans." As lieutenant governor, he backed tax breaks. He courted tech giants. He pushed incentives through the statehouse.

Now he's running for U.S. Senate. And his opponent, former Sen. Sherrod Brown, has turned those words into attack ads.

Brown's ads are pointed. They call Husted "the face of data centers in Ohio." They promise voters to "require the data centers pay the full cost of their electricity, not you."

Husted's response was telling. He introduced his own cost-allocation bill. The man who championed data center incentives is now writing laws to make them pay more.

Ohio isn't alone. Across the country, politicians who welcomed data center cash are scrambling to flip. Pennsylvania's governor imposed new requirements after years of promoting the state. New York's governor signed a statewide moratorium. The NRSC memo warned its own members: these attacks are working.

Thirty-five Ohio localities have passed moratoriums. The number keeps climbing. In state after state, data centers are moving from welcome mats to warning signs.

When a candidate writes legislation against his own record to survive a race, the politics have already shifted. The regulation always follows.

• BLACKOUT WATCH