// PC GAMER — GAMING
Data centers were some of the biggest losers in last night's US midterm elections
Voters across the country opted for nearly every local ballot measure that would curb the rate of data center expansion.
When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Here’s how it works.
On Tuesday, tens of millions of Americans voted in midterm elections to deliver a sweep of generational Democratic victories in federal and state races, reflecting a leftward electoral shift that's being interpreted as a nationwide rejection of Trumpism.
But even as Republican candidates and incumbents suffered defeats in what had traditionally been considered some of the party's most entrenched strongholds, the midterms also issued a stinging rebuke to another major source of voter frustration: Data centers. At nearly every opportunity, Americans voted in favor of local ballot measures to halt, slow, or stymie the pace of data center construction in their communities.
As tracked by Data Centers on the Ballot, across the 47 local midterm elections in the American cities and townships that featured ballot measures on data center construction, voters favored restrictions on the rate of data center expansion in 38 of the 39 completed counts. Of the eight races that remain open, voters supporting additional data center restrictions are leading in all six of the races with only partial reporting. For the two remaining races, no results have yet been posted.
Here's the rundown of the types of measures voters are supporting:
At time of writing, only one ballot measure that would have introduced data center restrictions failed: In Harwood, North Dakota, voters refused an amendment to the city charter that would have required Harwood to commission an independent review before approving new data center construction or expansion.
Aside from that one exception, it's not hard to suss out why so many of those measures have passed. NBC exit polls show that 56% of yesterday's midterm voters considered AI data centers either "crucial" or "a major factor" in their choice of Congress person, with data center opponents driven by concerns of environmental toll, energy costs, noise pollution, and—one must imagine—the upward-spiraling cost of RAM.
2026 games: All the upcoming gamesBest PC games: Our all-time favoritesFree PC games: Freebie festBest FPS games: Finest gunplayBest RPGs: Grand adventuresBest co-op games: Better together
From the creators of Edge: A free weekly videogame industry newsletter, featuring in-depth news, expert analysis and exclusive interviews