Ohio voters turned against the AI buildout on election day, and at least 14 municipalities approved outright bans or tighter limits on data centers, Fortune reported. The state ranks fifth in the country by number of data center projects and has over 200 facilities running, so the vote landed at the center of the buildout, not at its edge.
Ohioans weighed 21 measures across 18 municipalities. That is 21 of the 41 data center measures on ballots nationwide, according to Fortune. The Washington Post reported that at least 29 jurisdictions nationwide approved bans or restrictions of their own.
The local results were lopsided. Sunbury residents appear to have approved a charter amendment that outlaws facilities drawing 25 megawatts or more, a measure targeting a hyperscale Amazon project that may or may not still happen, NBC4 reported. Trenton passed its ban 80% to 20%, and organizers hope it keeps an Amazon Web Services site planned for 18 buildings out of town. The Journal-News reported it likely will not reach a smaller AWS campus, four buildings, already being built nearby. Ashville voters went further and backed blocking a campus that is under construction.
Other towns went after the money instead. In Perry, better than 87% of voters said developers who want tax breaks must hand the village financial guarantees. Wilmington voters, about 80% of them, rejected rezoning across four referendums written to make room for one data center project. Every one of the five central Ohio communities with a measure voted no. Fortune said results from Oregon were not yet in by Wednesday morning.
The polling had pointed this way. Gallup found in May that roughly 70% of Americans opposed data centers near them. A survey of 1,650 Ohio adults, run by Ohio Northern University’s civics institute with SurveyUSA, found 55% against construction in the state and 22% in favor, with 65% against tax breaks for the projects. Respondents named the environment as their top concern.
Industry money did not close that gap. DeSmog reported that Build American AI bought at least $2.54 million of Ohio television advertising from Sept. 7 to Oct. 21, spread over 16 channels. The group is tied to Leading the Future, a tech super PAC funded by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz of a16z, plus Greg Brockman, a cofounder of OpenAI. Its spots claimed data centers had brought $40 billion of investment and more than 95,000 jobs to Ohio, and they endorsed no candidates. Keith Durkin, who directs the Ohio Northern institute, told Fortune he has seen no industry advertising and no op-eds from the industry. Either his viewing habits are unusual or the spending reached few of the people who voted.
The politics cut across party lines. Tatishe Nteta, a political scientist at UMass Amherst, previously told Fortune that the skepticism is bipartisan, though Democrats have made data centers a wedge issue. Sherrod Brown, the Democrat who unseated Republican Sen. Jon Husted, argued for ending the tax breaks and making the companies pay for the utilities their campuses need. Husted backed the breaks.
Durkin told Fortune that strong turnout against expansion would tell statehouses everywhere to make ratepayer protections, transparency, and protecting the grid their priorities. Perry and Wilmington show what that looks like in practice: abatements tied to guarantees, and rezoning put to a public vote. A developer with an Ohio site still waiting on zoning or an abatement should now budget for a referendum and a demand for financial backing, and should expect the same questions in other states.
Reported by Fortune (Sasha Rogelberg) on 4 November 2026, with one figure attributed to The Washington Post, 4 November 2026.
