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By Alice Gibbs
Senior Reporter
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"There are so many people that want data centers," President Donald Trump declared Tuesday during a meeting with AI CEOs. But while the administration has championed the rapid expansion of AI infrastructure, recent polls suggest many Americans are wary of the massive facilities being built to power the technology.
Polls from Gallup and the Pew Research Center reveal that Americans have become significantly more negative about data centers over the last year, with communities sharing stories of hardship caused by the infrastructure and some Democratic lawmakers calling for a halt to the construction of all artificial intelligence data centers.
What Trump Said About AI Data Centers
On Tuesday, Trump met with tech CEOs to discuss the future of artificial intelligence, potential guardrails and even a name-change for the technology.
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During the meeting, the president signed an executive order directing federal agencies to stop using the terms "artificial intelligence" and "AI" in official communications, policy documents and correspondence, and to replace them with "Super Intelligence" and "SI."
Trump also signed a voluntary accord alongside six key names in AI, including Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, OpenAI President Greg Brockman, xAI CEO Elon Musk and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang. The document said that the signers vowed to advance their artificial intelligence models safely as safety concerns around the technology continue to grow.
Speaking to the press during the event, the president then turned to data centers, saying Americans wanted them and that they were about to become "very popular."
"The areas with data centers have become very rich. Their taxes have gone down, not up. And a lot of good things have happened," Trump said. "I think they’re going to do things for the community that will be really financially beneficial."
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What the Polls Say
While Trump appeared overwhelmingly positive about the future of data centers on Tuesday, polling shows that the American public may feel quite differently.
In May this year, a Gallup poll of 1,000 U.S. adults found that 71 percent of Americans oppose construction of AI data centers in their local area.
Of these, 70 percent said they worry either a great deal or a fair amount about the environmental impact of AI data centers.
Among reasons mentioned for opposing data centers in their local area, respondents cited effects on resources like water and energy, quality-of-life concerns, pollution and economic impact.
More recently, a September poll by the Pew Research Center asked over 10,000 U.S. adults about data centers. Of these, 60 percent said they would be uncomfortable with a new data center being built in their area.
When it comes to how people see the impact of data centers, 50 percent said they believe they are mostly bad for home energy costs, 49 percent said they are bad for the quality of life of nearby residents, and just 4 percent said they were good for the environment, energy costs or quality of life.
When approached by Newsweek for comment, the White House shared a collection of examples intended to demonstrate the economic and employment benefits of data centers, alongside statements from unions and other groups that support data center development.
Among them were a $110 million community benefits agreement tied to a proposed Catellus data center project in Frederick County, Maryland and Georgia Power's agreement to supply an OpenAI data center project, which the utility says could generate hundreds of millions of dollars in additional revenue and customer savings. The document also highlighted supportive statements from labor groups including the Laborers' International Union of North America and the United Association.
Growing AI Data Center Opposition
Opponents of AI data center infrastructure staged 142 protests over 42 states in July this year in a coordinated effort to draw attention to concerns over the building. More recently, the Puck Building in New York City was the setting for a rally demanding the freeze of AI infrastructure on September 15.
Lawmakers and politicians have also stepped in. In August 2026, Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott ordered a comprehensive audit of proposed data centers, effectively halting new grid connections until reviews were completed.
He argued that data centers could threaten grid reliability and local resources, adding in a statement that "data centers must pay their own way, protect our grid and water."
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Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro has become one of the most vocal Democratic governors on AI data centers. In August, he signed an executive order imposing strict requirements on data-center developers in the state, removing them from expedited permitting programs and requiring local approval.
"My message to data center developers is clear: if you can't agree to our strict requirements and get the community where you want to build to say 'yes,' you're not going to have the Commonwealth's support either," Shapiro said in a statement at the time.
In Illinois, Governor JB Pritzker has paused state tax incentives for new data centers amid concerns about costs and water resources.
"We have a responsibility to protect working families and local communities as the data center industry rapidly expands," Pritzker said in a statement.
Contact Newsweek editors on this story: Ben Kelly, James Debens, Sam Wilson.
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