Americans are getting crushed by rising costs everywhere they look.
But one source of pain is catching families completely off guard.
And Big Tech declared war on small-town America with this devastating move that's sending power bills through the roof.
State politicians sold out their own constituents for Big Tech money
Massive AI data centers are popping up across the country — in red states and blue states alike — consuming electricity at rates that would power a small city.
And Big Tech is just getting started. They want to blanket America with these facilities.
These warehouses are eight times more power-hungry than regular data centers.¹
State and local politicians from both parties are tripping over themselves to approve these projects. The promise of construction jobs and property tax revenue is too tempting to resist.
But here's what those politicians aren't telling you: they have no plan to actually power these monsters.
Small towns that never asked for a data center are waking up to find one approved down the road. Rural communities are discovering their peaceful way of life is about to be shattered by industrial-scale power demands.
U.S. data centers consumed 183 terawatt-hours of electricity in 2024 — more than 4% of the country's total power use.² That's equivalent to Pakistan's entire annual electricity demand.
By 2030, consumption is projected to hit 426 terawatt-hours.³
And that's just the beginning. Big Tech's AI ambitions mean thousands more data centers across America in places that never wanted them.
Someone has to pay for all that power. And it's not Amazon, Google, or Microsoft.
Working families are getting stuck with the bill while Big Tech rakes in profits.
In Virginia, residential electricity bills are projected to skyrocket by 25% to 70% by 2030.⁴ ⁵
The typical Dominion Energy customer faces an additional $14 to $37 per month by 2040.⁶
In Ohio, bills jumped $15 per month this summer.⁷
Georgia Power bills have risen six times over the past two years, now averaging $175 monthly.⁸
Politicians approved the data centers but won't build the power plants
Here's how the scam is playing out in state after state.
Local officials approve a massive data center. They show up for a ceremony with oversized scissors and hard hats. They promise economic development and job creation.
Then those same officials refuse to approve the power plants needed to actually run the thing.
Environmental activists mobilize every time someone proposes building real generating capacity. And politicians cave rather than fight back.
The grid gets overwhelmed. Existing customers see their bills explode. And the politicians who created the mess point fingers at everyone except themselves.
Daniel Turner, founder of Power the Future, told The Federalist the infrastructure crisis was entirely predictable.
"The surge in electricity consumption is like nothing we have ever seen before, and we're not remotely prepared for what AI means," Turner explained.⁹
Turner compared the data center boom to a county approving hundreds of new homes without upgrading roads or schools.
"We are building these things so damn fast that by the time they are online and activated, the problems are already built in, and then we go to our elected officials and say, 'Help!' and they give us the finger and say, 'Yeah, too bad. Deal with it,'" Turner said.¹⁰
States across the country handed Big Tech massive tax breaks to lure data centers.
Virginia's sales tax exemption alone provided more than $920 million in savings during fiscal year 2023.¹¹
Big Tech got the subsidies. Politicians got their photo ops. Regular Americans got the bill.
The cost is staggering and getting worse
Consumers in the PJM Interconnection grid — serving 65 million people across 13 states — will pay $16.6 billion to secure power supplies just to meet data center demand from 2025 through 2027.¹²
An independent watchdog called it a "massive wealth transfer" from consumers to the data center industry.¹³
Think about that. Families struggling to pay their electric bills are subsidizing the infrastructure so tech billionaires can train AI chatbots.
Wholesale electricity prices have more than doubled since 2020 in markets near data center hot spots.¹⁴ In areas near Baltimore, prices jumped 267%.
Monthly power bills now cost 267% more than five years ago in regions with significant data center activity.¹⁵
And 80 million Americans are now struggling to pay utility bills.¹⁶
Data center issue becoming political flashpoint
The backlash is starting to hit politicians who thought they could approve these projects without consequences.
In November elections, two Democrats won seats on Georgia's Public Service Commission, breaking Republican control for the first time in nearly two decades.¹⁷
Peter Hubbard told WIRED magazine that while affordability was voters' number one concern, data centers came in "a very close second" — "the concern around them just sucking up the water, the electricity, the land — and not really paying any taxes."¹⁸
Democrat Abigail Spanberger won Virginia's governor race promising to make data centers "pay their own way and their fair share."¹⁹
In New Jersey, governor-elect Mikie Sherrill pledged to declare a state of emergency over electric bills.²⁰
But here's the problem: these are the same politicians who approved the data centers and blocked the power plants in the first place.
Now they're running for office promising to fix the disaster they created.
Turner explained how politicians use data centers as political pawns.
"You have these governors and state officials who are thrilled with the data centers because they see it as tax revenue and more construction jobs," Turner said. "Then, when the electricity prices go through the roof, you get to blame" whoever's in the White House.²¹
At the federal level, President Trump is pushing to unleash American energy production and cut red tape on power plant construction. But data center approvals happen at the state and local level, where Trump has no control over corrupt politicians taking Big Tech money.
The solution exists but politicians won't implement it
Turner laid out a simple solution that would protect communities and still allow AI development.
Build data centers where America actually has abundant energy instead of cramming them into small towns and suburbs where the grid is already stressed.
"You can build a data center anywhere," Turner explained. "Why are we not building them on the north slope of Alaska where there is tons of natural gas, tons of water, tons of land? Why are we not building them on the Permian Basin where there's so much natural gas we're literally lighting it on fire because we can't build pipelines fast enough to capture it?"²²
America is flaring natural gas — burning it off as waste — in places like Texas because we produce so much energy that infrastructure can't capture it all.
Put the data centers there next to abundant energy instead of dropping them into communities in Northern Virginia or suburban Ohio where families are already struggling with high bills.
"We seem to be building these data centers where our elected officials want to cut ribbons and have glorious ceremonies, but that doesn't help the community," Turner said.²³
But that would require politicians to actually care about their constituents instead of photo ops and campaign contributions from Big Tech.
Right now Big Tech is on track to industrialize communities across America that never asked to become power plants for Silicon Valley's AI dreams.
The data center boom is exposing a fundamental corruption problem in American politics.
Politicians from both parties are more interested in ribbon-cutting ceremonies and tax revenue projections than they are in protecting the families and communities who elected them.
Big Tech gets subsidies. Politicians get headlines. Small-town America gets industrialized. And working families get electricity bills they can't afford so Mark Zuckerberg can train his next AI chatbot.
Until voters start throwing out every politician who approved a data center without a plan to power it, Big Tech will keep coming for your community next.
¹ Shawn Fleetwood, "AI Data Centers Are Wreaking Havoc On Local Communities Across America," The Federalist, December 5, 2025.
² "What we know about energy use at U.S. data centers amid the AI boom," Pew Research Center, October 24, 2025.
³ Ibid.
⁴ "How families could get stuck with higher electric bills if the AI data center boom goes bust," CNBC, December 3, 2025.
⁵ "Report: electric bills could increase up to 70% in next 5 years to meet data center demand," WJLA, December 2, 2024.
⁶ "Data Centers in Virginia," Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission, 2024.
⁷ "How data centers could be increasing your electric bill," Technical.ly, December 3, 2025.
⁸ "Voters' Anger at High Electricity Bills and Data Centers Looms Over 2026 Midterms," U.S. News, November 8, 2025.
⁹ Shawn Fleetwood, "AI Data Centers Are Wreaking Havoc On Local Communities Across America," The Federalist, December 5, 2025.
¹⁰ Ibid.
¹¹ "Data centers driving 'immense increase' in Virginia's energy demand," Cardinal News, February 12, 2025.
¹² "How families could get stuck with higher electric bills if the AI data center boom goes bust," CNBC, December 3, 2025.
¹³ Ibid.
¹⁴ "How AI Data Centers Are Sending Your Power Bill Soaring," Bloomberg, September 29, 2025.
¹⁵ "How data centers could be increasing your electric bill," Technical.ly, December 3, 2025.
¹⁶ "Voters' Anger at High Electricity Bills and Data Centers Looms Over 2026 Midterms," U.S. News, November 8, 2025.
¹⁷ Ibid.
¹⁸ "The Data Center Resistance Has Arrived," Society of Environmental Journalists, November 14, 2025.
¹⁹ "Skyrocketing electricity prices fuel political backlash against tech sector's AI data centers," CNBC, November 12, 2025.
²⁰ Ibid.
²¹ Shawn Fleetwood, "AI Data Centers Are Wreaking Havoc On Local Communities Across America," The Federalist, December 5, 2025.
²² Ibid.
²³ Ibid.
