Could Democrats gain votes from ‘lifelong Republicans’ upset over data centers?
Scout Moseley doesn’t shy away from the challenges of bull riding and “rodeoing,” and he’s now joining the fight against data centers locating in Johnson County.
Moseley, 26, who has two children, lives in Cleburne, and he describes himself as being against “big government.” He said he will support candidates, even Democrats, as long as they oppose data centers.
He recently created a Facebook page, Joco Citizens Against Data Centers, and also created bumper stickers with the slogan, “Keep Texas green.”
“I don’t care if you run and what you run on. As long as you stick to your guns on opposing data centers, I will support you. This is the biggest issue,” he said
Moseley is joining a growing number of people throughout Texas and the U.S. who are raising their voices against data centers locating in their communities.
According to the Texas Tribune, half of the 248 data centers planned in Texas will be in rural areas where there are few regulations, and counties have little authority to stop them from moving forward.
In Hood County, where an Amazon data center called Project Spectrum was approved on a 3-0 vote on May 26, residents Cheryl Shadden and Craig Jackson also said they will “flip their votes.”
Shadden, who helped organize an election to incorporate an area called Mitchell Bend in an attempt to regulate noise and pollution from Mara Digital Holdings, a cryptomining operation near her home, said local and state officials are not protecting the citizens.
The vote to incorporate failed, but Shadden is undeterred.
“The whole community is behind us. We will absolutely flip our votes,” she said.
“We’ve gotten to the point where we feel like we’ve been bulldozed over by Texas politicians. It’s about time now that the politicians listen to their constituents.”
Shadden said she has accepted an invitation to speak to the Hood County Democrats.
Craig Jackson, who lives in Granbury, is among four residents suing city officials alleging Open Meetings Act violations and that they hid details concerning Project Patriot on approximately 2,000 acres annexed into Granbury during a Jan. 6 meeting despite vehement opposition from residents.
The lawsuit described City Council members taking a tour of a Dallas data center days before the annexation vote. In April, the council voted to rezone the annexed land for a data center power plant, operated by Bilateral Energy.
The plaintiffs are asking for a permanent injunction, a jury trial and a reversal of the annexation.
Jackson said his home is 300 feet from the Project Patriot site.
“It’s just frustrating that I’m seeing a party that I’ve been aligned with just welcome an infrastructure that is harming people,” Jackson said.
Jackson said he supports a moratorium on data centers to allow time to study the impact.
Difficult to predict
Jim Riddlesperger, a political science professor emeritus at TCU, said data centers are a new territory and a new technology for people.
People are concerned about how they will use large amounts of electricity and deplete limited water resources.
“In the old days, you brought a factory to town with 2,000 jobs. ... Now, people are worried about quality of life issues,” he said.
Thirty years ago, people crossed over to support parties on some issues, and we could be seeing that return to “normal politics” again, he said.
“It’s classic politics, the NIMBY or not in my backyard principle, not in my town,” he said.
“People in some of these towns, whether they are in Granbury or Graham, sure, they want to attract business to Texas. They want the economy to grow, and they want Texas to be the center for data, but they don’t necessarily want it in their community,” he said.
Brandon Rottinghaus, a political science professor at the University of Houston, said changing people’s party preferences is very challenging.
“Seeing a mass migration of Republicans to Democrats is highly unlikely,” he said.
However, Rottinghaus added that Democrats can connect with rural voters on quality of life concerns such as pollution and water use.
In rural areas, single issues tend to be social issues, but data centers could end up being a single issue for voters, he said.
“This underscores the importance of both parties who can speak on what voters care about,” he said.
Mosely said he comes from a family that grew their own vegetables and raised livestock.
He worries that data centers will impact the rural areas in terms of using valuable water and land. He also worries about pollution and forever chemicals.
“I want my cows to have clean pastures and plenty of water. We may eat that cow eventually, but we want them to live a dang good life before that,” he said.