Meta’s warns that election backlash against data centers could make AI expansion harder

At the WSJ Tech conference, Meta President Dina Powell McCormick said Democratic wins in the midterm elections will make it harder for companies to build data centers. She noted that backlash against data centers—prominent in this election season—is tied to broader negative feelings about AI, since data centers are the visible manifestation of the technology. Meta believes it can improve sentiment by demonstrating the value of data centers to local communities and of AI itself. Powell McCormick highlighted Meta's 20 years of data center experience, with facilities in 23 states, including five planned at one gigawatt or more. She explained that successful projects involve Meta paying for its own electricity, directing tax surpluses to teachers and first responders, keeping labor local, and securing bipartisan support. Going forward, she expects more review of data center projects and weighing of whether constituents want them. Meta hopes its AI investments, including the Muse AI agent, will scale to billions of users, but even if not, the compute built will be valuable as there is daily demand to lease it.

(Source：TechCrunch)