Gen Z Blocks $228 Billion in Data Centers While Turning to Religion

Gen Z has helped block or delay more than $228 billion in AI data center projects since the start of 2025, according to research group Data Center Watch — and the same generation now identifies as religious at a higher rate than any other: 33%, versus 18% of Boomers, 22% of Gen X and 19% of Millennials.

Those two facts come from the same body of research. New Harris Poll data, shared with Fortune, upends two decades of polling that described Gen Z as the most secular cohort in American history. Gen Z's rate of identifying as "neither religious nor spiritual" stands at 19%, the lowest of any generation measured and below Boomers at 23%.

The data center numbers are equally concrete. More than 500 localities across 39 states have passed bans, moratoriums or other restrictions on data center construction. Data Center Watch counts 843 active opposition groups in 49 states.

A 'control element'

Libby Rodney, chief strategy officer at The Harris Poll, initially hesitated when Fortune asked whether the religious turn and the infrastructure revolt were two sides of the same story. Placed alongside the craze for "analog" trends in the AI economy, she responded: "I think you're onto something." The common thread, she said, is a "control element."

"That's the reason that they are spiritual—they're looking for some sense of agency and control," Rodney said of the religious data. Her polling found 57% of Gen Z say they turned to spirituality or manifestation practice specifically to feel greater control over their future. Another 60% say they belong to more real-world, in-person communities than they used to, and 70% say they want to join even more in the future.

The data center fight, she argued, runs on the same fuel. "The real thing that you can see is there's just no consent," Rodney said in an interview. "This idea that the world—the narrative that's out there from tech companies—is like this AI world is happening whether you like it or not. And so there's this lack of consent."

A movement with numbers behind it

The backlash is producing measurable results on a timeline that matters for the midterm elections. Local pushback blocked or delayed 45 projects worth $68 billion between April and June of this year alone, according to Data Center Watch. That followed a $130 billion disruption in the first quarter — the largest single-quarter total on record.

Gallup polling from March found seven in 10 Americans oppose data center construction near where they live. New York became the first state to impose a moratorium by executive order in July, pausing environmental permits for large facilities. Pennsylvania and Texas followed with their own restrictions. In California, officials in 15 cities and counties proposed or adopted moratoriums in a single month this fall.

Rodney pointed to the physical, local nature of the infrastructure as the reason the fight has traction where other AI debates have not. "All the other AI things are happening in the private sector or the national government," she said. "But this is something that happens at a local jurisdiction point of view. So the locality of it is huge. That is what makes people feel like they can have a difference."

Her research found 73% of Americans don't want AI imposed on their community, and 68% say AI can be useful but "feels forced."

The economic backdrop

The Harris Poll research also finds 70% of Gen Z say the future they were promised hasn't materialized, and 61% have skipped medical care because of cost. A companion finding from Harris Poll's Milken Institute research this spring showed a 41-point gap between how business leaders and workers see AI's financial upside: 68% of leaders expect to be better off in five years because of the technology, versus 27% of workers.

"They're on two completely different journeys," Rodney said, "and really no one's been talking to the American worker."

That vacuum, she argued, fills with fear rather than persuasion. "In this messaging void, the only things that they're hearing are… you might lose your job. Humanity might die," she said. "It's very logical and rational to not be down with that."

Bowling together again

Rodney agreed that Gen Z is acting against the grain of Robert Putnam's sociological classic Bowling Alone, the seminal study of the collapse of American civic life. When the Harris Poll works with universities, alumni gatherings are no longer "fancy drinks and cocktails and nice dinners," she said. Instead, "they're like, 'It's better to just put out chess boards and board games and cheap beer.'"

Seven in 10 Gen Zers in the survey said they've reached out for help or leaned on others in the past year — more than any other generation. "Religion is coming back because it's a couple of things," Rodney said. "It's physical spaces, but it's people who help and it's community that comes together."

The contrast with millennials is stark. The Patriot Act passed in 2001 amid warnings over privacy loss but little organized action, and the Iraq War drew protests yet ground on for years. Gen Z, Rodney said, is affecting the conversation in a way millennials did not.

Whether the data center fight becomes a durable political realignment or a moment-specific backlash remains unsettled. Moratoriums can be reversed, and developers have already begun suing local jurisdictions over bans. But the polling tells a consistent story: the generation forecast to be the most secular, atomized and politically disengaged in American history is showing up to church more than the Boomers who raised them — and organizing against a trillion-dollar buildout with more discipline than the generation before it ever managed.