The public is quickly souring on data centers and Democratic candidates in must-win states are attempting to harness that energy –– but this strategy is putting them at odds with some of their biggest allies.
Data centers, the big buildings housing the servers that power artificial intelligence, need skilled construction laborers, like electricians and pipe fitters, to build them. Good-paying jobs for working class communities have been vanishing over the last 40 years, and the unions that represent the workers in construction see data centers as the kinds of jobs they’d been dreaming of for decades.
“It’s a generational opportunity for the working class to get back into the middle class,” Don Slaiman, the political coordinator for I.B.E.W. Local 26, which represents electrical workers in the Washington, D.C., area, said. “These folks are getting to the middle class without a struggle. This is a chance to rebuild the relationship between the workers and capital. And none of the politicians from either party are recognizing that.”
In Ohio, a crucial state for Democrats, the backlash to data centers is playing a central role in campaigns. Sherrod Brown represented Ohio in the Senate from 2007 until he was defeated by Sen. Bernie Moreno (R-OH) in 2024. Now, Brown is running against Sen. John Husted (R-OH), who was appointed to the seat after JD Vance vacated it in order to become vice president. Brown’s using data centers as a talking point against Husted, accusing him of using $2.5 billion taxpayer dollars to build them.
“They come in, they swallow up the land, they gulp up the water, people don’t have any say in where these data centers are going. And then, electric bills have gone up,” Brown said to a crowd of rallygoers this week.
He’s not the only Ohio candidate who is speaking out against data centers. Amy Acton, the Democratic candidate for governor, is taking it further and calling for a moratorium on new data centers being built in the state. “I am calling on lawmakers from across the aisle to come together and fight against the unchecked development of data centers driving up costs in our communities,” she said in a statement.
For unions, though, a moratorium hardly makes any sense. “For the last 50 years, I have heard people whine and complain about industry leaving America and going to foreign countries,” Willie Koester, a political consultant and member of the Ohio State Association of Plumbers & Pipefitters told Politico. “And now, data centers are the future, as much as people don’t want to admit it. So now we’re going to turn our back on this?”
But to some Democrats, data centers are more than just job creation machines.
Michigan’s Democratic Senate candidate, Abdul El-Sayed, released a detailed policy platform on data centers earlier this year. And he held a rally in front of a controversial data center construction project to call for more oversight. “I stand with local and state elected officials saying that we cannot approve any more of these until we have federal-level guardrails," he said.
James Talarico, Texas’ Democratic candidate for Senate, feels similarly.
“I think data centers brings together a lot of the issues that people are concerned about: cost of living, corruption in our government, artificial intelligence, and the fact that our government seems to be MIA when it comes to creating guardrails for this new technology,” he told CNBC in early September.
Some of the common complaints against data centers is the environmental impact. These new buildings that power the AI models that have quickly become a part of everyday life have shown to strain the electrical grid and consume copious amounts of water.
A September poll from Pew Research Center found that 60% of Americans would not be comfortable if a data center began operating in their neighborhood. Another 54% of respondents said the new projects are bad for the environment and half said they have a negative impact on home energy costs. The sentiment is shared across the political spectrum, so it comes as no surprise that Democrats and Republicans are including data centers in their messaging.
But the workers who are suddenly in demand, feel like there’s more to the story.
“What we’d like folks to understand is what this has meant for working people,” Slaiman told The Caucus. “It’s been generations since the rug was pulled out from underneath working folks because of trade policies.” Slaiman says the pay begins at approximately $27 an hour and tops out at $62 an hour.
It’s a long way from the union jobs of yesteryear, which could sometimes be dangerous and frequently involved workers fighting to get their union recognized.
“We’re trying to build back the middle class,” Slaiman said. “We were never listened to by either party during the 90s and the aughts. And hopefully somebody listens to us now because these are great careers.”
(Photo: Dr. Amy Acton, vs. Dr. Amy Acton Facebook)