71% of Americans Just Voted No on AI Data Centers

本站添加: 2026-06-03

[00:00:00]71% of Americans just told pollsters they don't want an AI data center in their town.

[00:00:06]Big Tech bet a trillion dollars that they'd say that. So, Big Tech has spent the last 2 years telling investors, telling Washington, basically telling anybody who will listen that the AI build-out is just inevitable. Hey, it's coming. Get used to it. Uh the communities will that communities will get on board once they see the jobs that are created out of this, once they see things like the tax revenue. And then also once they understand what's at stake, again acting like we don't know what's happening. So, Gallup just ran the first major national poll asking this question. They asked over a thousand Americans whether they support building an AI data center in their local community.

[00:00:46]71% said no. 48% were very strongly no.

[00:00:52]And that's not a fringe, that's not a protest, that's seven out of ten Americans. Now, granted, that poll was only a thousand people, and this does go across party lines. In fact, when interviewed, they told them that the reasons weren't vague. Half the opponents cited excessive resource use, specifically 18% named water, 18% named energy, another 20% raised quality of life. Another 20 cited economic feels fears, including higher utility bills, costs of living increases, infrastructure cost uh landing on us, the taxpayers. These aren't people who don't unnecessarily even understand technology. These are people asking questions exactly right here. What happens to my water supply? What's going to happen to my electric bill? Who's paying for all of these grid upgrades?

[00:01:40]Now, here's where the number that should make every data center developer a little bit nervous. Gallup found that AI data centers have now surpassed nuclear power plants as the most opposed local infrastructure in America. Nuclear. The thing that's had a stigma since Three Mile Island, data centers actually just raise the bar, if you will. Uh the resistance is actually costing real money in a lot of cases, at least 48 data center projects representing somewhere around 156 billion dollars in planned investment were blocked or stalled by community opposition just last year in 2025. So, Big Tech is wagered about a trillion dollars on community saying yes.

[00:02:22]Unfortunately for Big Tech, they're on they're saying no a lot. They're saying it actually quite loudly, and now we're seeing more and more of this pick up.

[00:02:33]The question isn't whether the AI build-out is happening. The question is whether it's happening on the terms that the communities actually agree to. Right now, the answer from 71% of Americans is that they were never asked. So, my question today is your community being asked about this?

[00:02:52]What are you going to do about it?