Voters gave a big middle finger to data centers

This analysis and news roundup come from the Canary Media Weekly newsletter. Sign up to get it every Friday. Americans aren't happy about the data center boom, and they made their displeasure pretty clear this Election Day.

Voters not only selected a slate of Democratic candidates who campaigned against data centers; they also approved more than 30 ballot measures aimed at reining in the power-hungry facilities. You could argue that the "data center elections" really started a year ago, when Virginians selected Democrat Abigail Spanberger as their next governor.

Virginia has more than earned its status as the data center capital of the world, with the latest estimates counting more than 700 facilities around the state, and Spanberger ran on a promise to keep their intense power demand in check. In the months that followed, it became clear that data center developers were circling in on Great Lakes states and their abundant water resources — and that fighting the facilities was a winning campaign strategy.

Take Michigan's Democratic U.S. Senator-elect Abdul El-Sayed, who made data center regulation a prominent piece of his candidacy, and William Lawrence , a Democrat who won his U.S. House race after showing up at a local council meeting to fight a proposed data center.

Meanwhile in Ohio, Sherrod Brown, a three-term Democratic senator who was ousted in 2024, will return to the chamber. Brown's campaign painted his Republican opponent as "the face of data centers," even though it cost Brown the support of some union labor allies who've backed him for decades but see data centers as creators of construction jobs.

Data centers' threat is even more palpable in Georgia and Texas, which have more projects in the pipeline than any other state except Virginia. Georgia Sen. Jon Ossoff (D) was easily reelected after criticizing data centers as part of his campaign and investigating their impact on power bills in the Senate.

Georgia's Democratic Gov.-elect Keisha Lance Bottoms has meanwhile pledged a "pause" on new data center construction once she takes office in January. And Democrats James Talarico and Gina Hinojosa scored historic wins in Texas for U.S. Senate and governor, respectively, after promising to pursue a slate of data center regulations.

Anti–data center sentiment this election cycle was so strong that even some Republicans promised restrictions — Michigan Senate candidate Mike Rogers called for a one-year moratorium in the state, for example. But some still sided with data centers, like Sen. Darline Graham of South Carolina, who benefited from an industry-funded ad campaign before losing a seat she had been expected to retain.

And when the data center debate showed up in ballot measures across dozens of counties and municipalities, voters gave a resounding response : Rein them in. More big energy stories How energy prices showed up on the ballot Data centers weren't the only energy issue motivating voters this week.

With gasoline prices at their highest level of any Election Day in U.S. history, and falling temperatures getting Americans thinking about heating bills, it's no wonder that voters were looking for a change. While President Donald Trump has been promising to curb energy costs since his 2024 campaign, his decisions have driven prices in the opposite direction.

Experts say that perhaps his most drastic mistake was starting a war with Iran, spiking oil prices that have yet to return to anything resembling the pre-conflict normal. That impact has been especially obvious in Maine, where half the residents rely on heating oil — and where voters ousted longtime Republican Sen.

Susan Collins on Tuesday. Utility bills were literally on the ballot in nine states this week, as voters selected new members to regulatory boards that oversee utility rate hikes and other energy-related decisions. While most of the states preserved the status quo and elected Republicans, Georgia voters gave Democrats the majority on their Public Service Commission for the first time in 30 years.

What do Democrats' wins mean for permitting? As the U.S. Senate prepares for its drastically new makeup come January, it's also got a major vote to tackle in the next few days.

The chamber is planning to vote Nov. 9 on long-awaited energy permitting reform legislation — that is, if newly emboldened Democrats don't try to reshape the bill. While the package was crafted by two Democrats and two Republicans, some Congress members on the left have demanded edits to minimize its benefits for fossil fuels and prioritize clean energy development.

They've renewed that call in the blue wave's wake, with Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), who is likely to chair the House Natural Resources Committee in a Democrat-led Congress, saying that voters showed "they don't want this dirty, fossil-fuel-expanding bill." House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D) also called for revisions to the bill to protect tribal sovereignty and blunt impacts to the National Environmental Policy Act.

Bill co-sponsor Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) contended that the election results revealed the opposite: Americans are focused on "affordability," he wrote on X, and achieving that requires building more clean energy projects by passing the permitting bill. CANARY CATCH-UP More election results: Democrats are poised to take full control of six more state governments, giving them leverage to enact more ambitious clean-energy policies.

Voters also approved a handful of clean energy–boosting ballot measures, and rejected some that would prop up fossil fuels and weaken environmental regulations. ( Canary Media , Canary Media ) Thankful for solar: Two cranberry bogs in Massachusetts are marking their second harvest of fruit grown in the shadow of solar panels — and just may be the only cranberry bogs in the world paired with solar. ( Canary Media ) A real Revolution: Danish developer Ørsted says its Revolution Wind farm off the Connecticut and Rhode Island coasts is fully operating, a major win as the Trump administration tries yet another tactic to shut down the project. ( Canary Media ) Data center solutions?

Two new reports make the case for how batteries and virtual power plants can address some of data centers' biggest challenges to the grid and customers' utility bills. ( Canary Media , Canary Media ) Sunny side up: The U.S. has built a strong solar panel and cell supply chain, but is still lacking in polysilicon and wafer manufacturing capacity. ( Canary Media )