'America hates data centers' — New data highlights public sentiment
A new website seeks to distill over 10,000 public comments about data centers in the community across more than 410 local governments, and the consensus is that people don't like them one bit.
As the number of AI data centers grows across the United States, a new website called American Sentiment has emerged to highlight the growing public opposition to these facilities. Operated by Prophecy Gov, an AI startup based in San Francisco, the site has analyzed 10,202 public comments from 417 local government meetings between 2026, revealing that 90.5% of these comments were negative.
The data suggests that the discussion around data center buildouts has reached a fever pitch, with 906 public meetings tracked from across all 48 states. Of these meetings, 73% had no supporters of data centers, and even among those who were in favor, supporters were outnumbered 6:1. The most common concerns raised against data centers were related to water usage, with a single AI data center project consuming 29 million gallons of water in May 2026, leading to a drop in local water pressure.
Other issues included the impact on local quality of life, lack of transparency, and the negative effects of AI.
Interestingly, AI and its potential negative effects were only mentioned in 21% of the comments, with only 4 out of 5 people not discussing AI at all. Notable figures opposing data centers included Google, Amazon, Meta, Microsoft, Elon Musk, Sam Altman, and Peter Thiel. While opinions differed between urban, suburban, and rural areas, both red and blue counties showed similar levels of opposition. Notably, union workers were the only group largely in favor of data centers, with 79% supporting their construction.
Written by urgent.news from Tom's Hardware's reporting — not their text. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
