POLITICO asked 2,000 people about data centers — and made 5 charts

The massive server-filled data centers behind each ChatGPT prompt and Amazon purchase are ballooning into a political headache the White House and the tech industry can’t ignore.

It’s an issue spanning Arizona to Virginia to Wisconsin to Florida, and sparking fights about electricity costs and jobs. Yet even as these complexes spread quickly to keep up with the artificial intelligence boom, there’s very little public information that attempts to explain what people think of these projects.

POLITICO moved to fill that gap.

Our polling of more than 2,000 people found that nearly half of Americans expect the explosion of these projects to be a campaign issue in their area in the next five years — setting up the midterms as a new test of voter appetites for the build-out and energy costs of AI.

The POLITICO Poll also found that many Americans are willing to support a new data center in their area even if it hikes their electric bills a bit. Many respondents also acknowledged that they don’t know much about the facilities — but their views swing noticeably if data centers are associated with President Donald Trump, a political issue the industry will likely have to confront.

And even though a good portion of everyday Americans seem to be confused about the whole data center debate, a majority still back building them in the U.S.

In total, our poll, conducted by our London-based independent polling partner, Public First, produced what is perhaps the most comprehensive snapshot to date on how people feel about these projects, what they think they know about them, who they trust to give them accurate information and how it all might affect their voting habits.

Even though affordability became a buzzword after last year’s elections, many Americans open to building a data center in or near their community are willing to pay more for them — to a point.

The tipping point for most? Somewhere between $10 and $25 a month. Most people aren’t interested in going above that.

At an increase of $10 to monthly energy bills, support halved for a data center being built locally. At a proposed $25 cost spike, support among those likely to support a project fell to 39 percent. In that scenario, 48 percent of people who had originally said they could support a proposed data center would oppose it. At a hypothetical $50 cost increase, opposition jumped to almost 60 percent.

The findings echo Americans’ concerns about the affordability of everything from eggs to housing. According to the poll, the cost of living ranked first as top concerns of adults at 50 percent, followed by the “poor state of the economy.”

Previous surveys have shown that support for energy resources or climate policies drops when there’s an added cost, although the shift varies by dollar amount and issue. A University of Chicago poll in 2023, for instance, found majority support for the idea of paying $1 monthly to combat climate change, but that plunged to 43 percent at $10 and 36 percent at $40.

Christopher Borick, a professor of political science at Muhlenberg College in Pennsylvania, said when support for an issue declines quickly because of added costs, it shows just how fragile the support is. “In the case of data centers I think it indicates that the intensity of support may be fairly limited, compared to the intensity of opposition.”

He said he’s observed this phenomenon in northeastern Pennsylvania, where supporters of data centers seem less committed to their advocacy than project opponents. Amazon has pledged to spend more than $20 billion on data centers in Pennsylvania.

The rise of artificial intelligence carries plenty of existential questions about jobs, education and socialization. For data centers, though, the top concern is electricity.

Respondents ranked higher electricity prices and the risk of blackouts as their top concerns with data centers, higher than other suggestions like job losses or whether they will cost taxpayer money. Those results were largely true across political parties and age groups, with one key exception: 30 percent of respondents aged 18-24 cited job losses as a top concern, outranking electricity prices and reliability.

Evidence is mixed about whether data centers are driving up power prices, but it speaks to the political liability technology companies face. According to federal data, electricity prices rose 6.7 percent last year — faster than inflation — although that reflects a variety of causes including outdated infrastructure repairs and extreme weather.

The electricity concerns outranked other negative features of data centers, like their potential for noise pollution or damage to the environment. On the flip side, supporters said that the top reasons to build data centers in their area were job creation, secure data storage in the U.S. and growth potential for tech companies.

Matthew DeCourcey, a vice president in the energy practice at the Charles River Associates consulting firm, said that voters’ concerns about electricity prices may be misplaced. A recent report coauthored by DeCourcey found that data centers haven’t yet driven up prices nationally, although they have been linked to higher power prices in the massive PJM Interconnection grid that covers parts of the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic. And as data centers grow bigger and strain more of the grid, he said, there’s an opportunity for policymakers to force more costs on tech companies.

“Regulators, policymakers and customers state by state are taking different approaches, but are adopting a similar set of principles that will hold existing customers harmless and make sure costs go to the right places,” McCourcey said. “And increasingly, we are seeing the data center developers themselves come out and align with this.”

Americans’ views of data centers appear to depend partly on whether they tie expansion of the technology to President Trump and a push for artificial intelligence.

Adults were asked whether they supported or opposed a plan to build more data centers in the U.S., without any mention of the president. In that generic scenario, half of respondents backed the concept, including 61 percent of people who voted for Trump in the 2024 election and 49 percent of those who supported former Vice President Kamala Harris. More than a third, or 36 percent, of undecided voters heading into the midterm elections also gave a thumbs up to the idea of a buildout.

But when respondents were asked if they would support a push by Trump to develop AI models by building data centers across the U.S., support fell sharply among Democrats and undecideds.

In that case, 28 percent of Harris supporters and 15 percent of undecided voters heading into the midterms said they backed building data centers across the U.S. – a roughly 20 percent drop in both groups.

Barry Rabe, a professor emeritus of public policy at the University of Michigan, said the large shift between the two questions signals that both the Trump label and specific AI labels carry some political baggage.

"But since the shifts are most pronounced among Democrats and midterm undecideds, it would seem that the Trump brand is particularly toxic for those groups, consistent with overall polling trends in past months," Rabe said.

Trump’s overall disapproval rating has increased roughly 10 points in the past year, underscoring political challenges facing the president. At the same time, some previous surveys indicate that many Americans have negative views of artificial intelligence and are concerned that the technology could cost U.S. jobs or hinder privacy.

The POLITICO survey also shows that women are less likely than men to back a data center expansion. Fifty-eight percent of men and 41 percent of women said they supported building more data centers around the country overall.

With Trump’s name in the question, support for a buildout dropped 15 points among women — to 26 percent compared to a 12 point drop for men.

Call it the NIMBY problem.

Thirty-seven percent of respondents said they’d support or strongly support a new data center within three miles of their home, while 28 percent would oppose or strongly oppose construction. The results held true across both parties, even as a majority of respondents understood that data centers should go in specific places to work well.

By contrast, respondents were more likely to support construction of a train station (45 percent strongly support or support), a road or highway (53 percent), a shopping mall (49 percent), low-income housing (57 percent) or a delivery warehouse (50 percent). Even a new power plant or electric infrastructure (36 percent) was roughly even with support for a data center.

The reality is evident on the ground. A report by Data Center Watch, a research firm tracking data center opposition, found that $98 billion worth of data center construction was blocked or delayed in just the second quarter of 2025, affecting projects from Minnesota to Georgia. That’s prompted large tech companies to step up local advertising and public relations and commit to being better neighbors.

The closer someone lives to an existing data center, the more likely they’d be to support a new one. Of those within a mile of a data center, 53 percent would support building one. For respondents 20 miles or more away, support dropped to 31 percent. That suggests that urban voters used to data center development are more likely to support more construction than those in sparser areas seeing them for the first time.

As much as data centers are becoming key features of the political landscape, people aren’t confident in their understanding of what they are and how they operate.

The POLITICO Poll asked respondents a series of questions about data centers, including whether they will allow more artificial intelligence to be developed, what their impact on the environment will be and how they would be used. When asked how confident they were in their answers, only 21 percent said they felt “very confident,” and 44 percent said “somewhat confident.”

Roughly a quarter of respondents said they either didn't know what a data center is, or answered inaccurately about their main function. Fifteen percent of people, for example, selected options such as a data center is "where members of the public can put on virtual reality goggles and play games" or "a factory for the construction of technology like phones and computers."

What’s more, the poll showed a potentially sizable pool of undecided people, leaving room for tech companies and politicians to sway their support. When asked about building a data center within three miles of where they live, more than a third of respondents – 36 percent – neither supported nor opposed the idea. And data centers ranked low when voters were asked to identify the top issues facing America.

Tech companies have been working to fill the void, with advertisements and public outreach designed to highlight the jobs and economic benefits the AI boom could provide. Companies have also been amping up their public support for policies that would lower costs; Microsoft, for example, aligned itself with President Trump’s call for tech companies to pay more for the power costs of their infrastructure.