Data Centers Are Now a Midterm Issue — Even in Brooklyn Warehouses

Nearly $200 billion in data center projects were delayed, stalled, or blocked in the first half of 2026, according to a report from Data Center Watch — and the political fight has now reached a blue-lit warehouse in Brooklyn.

The event, held Thursday evening five days before the November 3 midterms, was hosted by Newsreel, the media company founded by former Forbes and Newsweek reporter Jack Brewster. The stated goal was simple. Brewster said he wanted people to "put their phones away and talk to each other about the election, five days out."

That's not quite what happened. One topic consumed nearly every conversation: AI, data centers, and the backlash against the growing technocracy.

What happened at the event?

The lineup mixed tech and politics. Kenneth Schlenker, co-founder of the focus app Opal, sat for a fireside chat on "the state of attention." Aryan Banjan, who built the campaign management software Barza, delivered a midterm forecast. A later panel featured NewsNation host Batya Ungar-Sargon, political strategist Morris Katz — who worked on Zohran Mamdani's campaign — and Vox's Astead Herndon, nominally on the future of the Democratic Party.

New York City Council member Chi Ossé set the tone in his own fireside chat. He said he doesn't really use AI, described himself as a democratic socialist but a "law and order" one, and called for tech executives to be held more accountable and trillionaires like Elon Musk taxed more. When CEOs talk about a technology that could deplete 10% of human civilization, he said, "they should be called to testify in front of Congress."

How hostile is the crowd?

When the data center panel took the stage — moderated with Maia Woluchem, a technology and human rights researcher, and Hilary Flint, an environmental and public health advocate — a quick poll settled the mood. Asked "Who here is pro-AI data center?", the moderator was promptly booed.

The panel and audience aired a range of grievances:

• Big tech companies appear to be cutting secret deals with local officials to build billion-dollar data centers.
• Zoning rules sometimes make it unclear what is being built until it's too late to protest.
• Residents feel they've lost control over their communities and worry about environmental and health risks.
• Tech leaders talk about AI replacing workers while people struggle with the cost of living.

The panel agreed that data centers are the physical embodiment of people's fears and anger toward the tech class and the pace of technology.

"What is a life worth?" Flint said, when asked about the benefits some communities have seen from data center build-outs. People keep protesting, she said, because they "value their lives a little bit more than a temporary check."

Do unions and communities actually benefit?

The tension isn't purely anti-tech. Ungar-Sargon noted during the later panel that some labor unions support data centers for the promised jobs — though reports show data centers create many jobs during construction that don't remain once it ends.

"There used to be a lot of pride in a community in the Rust Belt about very ugly, enormous buildings in their communities because everybody worked there," she said. "And they knew that building represented prosperity for themselves, stability for their children, and a future and a piece of the American dream."

Herndon pointed to Vivek Ramaswamy being booed for making a similar point in Ohio. "I just want to reinforce the lack of consent happening," he said. "Because that's true among Republicans in those places and I've watched it."

Katz went further. "It's the same people who have taken so many union jobs away," he said. "The same institutional powers that have robbed labor and working people of jobs and profit. Now coming back to essentially finish the job and take whatever scraps remain."

Is this really a national electoral issue?

The data suggests yes. Beyond the $200 billion in stalled projects, states including Pennsylvania, Georgia, Texas, New York, and Virginia are weighing new guardrails and transparency rules. Virginia alone — already nicknamed the "data center capital of the world" — has hundreds of new data centers planned.

Brewster said AI and data centers came up in every on-stage conversation and ranked second among topics in RSVP questions. "AI has become an election issue for regular voters," he said. "In rural communities, the backlash is about feeling replaced. In a place like Brooklyn, it's more about who gets rich from it."

The backlash is spreading to places far from server country. A software engineer at the event said data centers are popping up in her Southern California hometown, where neighbors in her Chinese immigrant community put yard signs showing dragons choking a data center. The signs have since been translated into other languages — a small signal of how local the fight over AI's physical footprint has become.