Across the country, discontent has exploded over the ever-growing glut of server farms that have accompanied the AI boom. Anger has grown so loud that it’s begun to shift legislative agendas. Some states and communities are mulling temporary bans on new data center development altogether. Earlier this month, New York joined the club, with a bold new proposal to halt the local cloud build-out in its tracks. A new bill in New York State would impose a three-year moratorium on the issuance of new permits for data center construction throughout the state, while local regulators are given a chance to study the environmental and economic impacts the industry is having on communities. The bill’s co-authors, state senator Liz Krueger and Assemblymember Anna Kelles, have called the legislation the “strongest” introduced in the country. While no statewide moratoriums have passed so far, local bans are proliferating fast. Several weeks before Krueger and Kelles introduced their bill, the New Orleans City Council passed a moratorium, pausing all new data center construction in the city for one year. In early January, Madison, Wisconsin, passed a similar law after protests erupted over regional tech projects. Similar policies have also passed in droves of communities throughout construction hot spots like Georgia and Michigan, as well as in many other regions throughout the country. Environmental activists have long taken aim at data centers, but the more recent concerns have come from high-level lawmakers, drawing on populist anger at the tech industry broadly. In conservative Florida, for instance, Gov. Ron DeSantis recently announced an AI “bill of rights” that gives local communities the right to limit new data center construction. In liberal Vermont, U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders has suggested a nationwide moratorium. And in Arizona, where the political milieu is decidedly mixed, Gov. Katie Hobbs recently said she supported pulling the industry’s tax incentives. Politicians have even begun to fight over the topics, with the governor of Mississippi taking shots at Sanders online over his moratorium proposal. The political resistance is coming just as tech companies commit more and more money to building out infrastructure. The four biggest spenders — Amazon, Google, Meta, and Microsoft — plan to spend a whopping $650 billion in capital expenditures over the next year, the vast majority of it going to data center build-outs. Even more spending is planned in the following years, as the companies race to secure as much compute capacity as possible. Techcrunch event Boston, MA | June 9, 2026 But the speed and scale of those projects has made them increasingly unpopular, according to recent polling. A recent Echelon Insights poll found 46% of respondents would oppose plans to build a data center in their community, compared with 35% in support. A different poll from Politico found that, while there is considerable concern about the facilities, many voters don’t have much of an opinion either way — making it possible for public sentiment to be swayed in either direction. The industry is already spending big to attempt to change those numbers — at least in the regions where it matters. In January, the Financial Times reported that some of the industry’s biggest data center operators were planning a “lobbying blitz,” with plans to “boost spending on targeted advertising and engagement” aimed at the communities where they build. Tech companies are also making real concessions, like the planned Rate Payer Protection Pledge that would make them responsible for supplying power to any new AI data centers. But it’s not clear those measures will be enough to bring the public around. Dan Diorio, of the Data Center Coalition, argued, in a conversation with TechCrunch, that data centers should appeal to smaller communities because they provide revenue without straining those communities’ limited resources. If the incentives are cut off and companies decide not to build in those places, the revenue also won’t be there. “That’s where statewide policy considerations come in,” he said. “Are you going to limit communities in which these businesses could be a significant benefit for them?” The logic behind pressing pause In general, data center moratoriums are meant to give communities breathing room while policymakers study the potential costs and benefits of allowing such facilities to be built in their communities. The rate of construction in some states has accelerated at such a pace that communities are unsure of how the industry will impact them in the long run. Justin Flagg, director of communications and environmental policy for Sen. Krueger’s office, told TechCrunch that the legislation was driven, in part, by what he called the energy affordability crisis in New York. Said crisis has troubled both rate payers and politicians.