Opponents of the buildout of data centers held 142 protests across 42 states on July 18, coordinated by a former leader of the modern-day Tea Party movement.
“They just woke up one day and found out they’re going to have this monstrosity in their community, and they don’t want it,” said Kremer, who predicted that data centers would be a defining issue in November’s midterm elections and the 2028 presidential race.
“Today, 142 communities across 42 states stood together to send a simple message: Americans deserve a voice before Big Tech reshapes their communities. This was never about politics,” HumansFirst said in a July 18 post on X.
“It was about families, property rights, water, electricity, home values, local control, and government accountability. Thank you to every community that stood together to protect our homes, communities, and country. Today was the beginning. Not the end.”
Josh Levi, president of the Data Center Coalition, the industry’s association and lobbying group, said, “The data center industry is continuing to work with policymakers, stakeholders, and residents to ensure data centers strengthen, not strain, the areas where they operate—while mitigating any negative impacts to households and businesses.”
HumansFirst says that the “conservative movement has been transformed by President Trump into a movement that puts the interests of everyday Americans first.”
“Now, Big AI globalists seek to hijack our movement to get Washington, D.C. to put Big AI before the American people. Humans First is the start of the fight to reclaim our country,” it says.
HumansFirst shared a July 17 Fox interview with the president of the conservative think tank, Kevin Roberts, who said that he was skeptical of artificial intelligence data centers.
“The people there feel like something is being taken from them; they’re not anti-free market,” Roberts said.
“Earlier this week, all of us who were customers of a particular energy company in Virginia got an email that said your costs are going up $8 a month.
“Because they need the money. They say to build the capacity transmission lines for the electricity to go to the data centers. This is a very real issue.
“I’m with those people who are skeptics who also want to have the win-win, so that we can continue to reap the benefits of this great technology.”
Texas, where many data centers are planned, hosted 18 protest events, the most of any state.
Georgia had 11 rallies, California had eight, and Pennsylvania, Florida, and Indiana had seven.
The United States currently has more than 3,100 data centers in operation and more than 1,800 in various stages of development, according to the infrastructure intelligence and mapping platform Data Center Map.
Virginia, Texas, and California lead the nation in the number of data centers, according to the platform. Virginia alone has a combined total of 711 currently operational, under-construction, and planned centers. Texas has a combined total of 544, and California has 333.
According to Data Center Watch, community opposition to data centers is surging nationwide, shifting from individual zoning disputes into a national political force.
An estimated $152 billion in potential investment was blocked or delayed in 2025, including $98 billion in the second quarter alone—more than all disruptions combined since 2023 and affecting 20 projects, the research organization’s data show.
The activity accelerated sharply in the third and fourth quarters, when hundreds of activist groups across 42 states organized to block the construction or expansion of data centers.
A Redfin-commissioned, Ipsos-conducted survey found that 47 percent of residents oppose the construction of AI data centers in their neighborhoods, while 38 percent support them.
The survey also showed that younger Americans are more likely to support building data centers in their “backyard.” Politically, 49 percent of Republicans and 36 percent of Democrats support the construction of data centers.
