PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Democrats and Republicans appear to agree on one thing: They’re opposed to data centers. That’s according to a new Penn survey, which found opposition to data centers rose by 12 percentage points since February.
The University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg Public Policy Center surveyed 1,320 U.S. citizens between June and July and found 61% of Americans said they are opposed to the construction of new data centers in their area.
Opposition is strongest among adults under 30.
“It’s not just that this is in one particular area or region of the country or party,” said Matt Levendusky, a professor of political science at Penn. “It seems to be similar for people who use AI versus [those who] don’t. It really seems to be a quite broad-based opposition to data centers that seems to be independent of people’s attitudes toward AI.”
Even as opinions on AI remained steady, the survey found 39% of Americans expect AI to create a negative impact over the next 10 years; 18% expect a positive impact.
“We asked these folks earlier in the year about their attitudes toward AI and data centers, and while their attitudes about AI generally didn’t really change very much, their attitudes about data centers did quite a bit,” Levendusky added.
He said the next survey will focus on figuring out why Democrats, Republicans and Independents all agree on this issue. They will investigate several contributing factors, like rising electricity prices and the overall national attention data centers have been getting.
