Chris Johnson: Data center boom rescuing forgotten American towns

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Fox News opinion writer Chris Johnson argues that data centers — an increasingly popular political target as the midterm elections approach — are rescuing forgotten American towns. His lead exhibit is Ellendale, North Dakota, population 1,100, where Applied Digital's 11-billion-dollar development has lifted sales tax revenue from roughly 400,000 dollars a year to 3.5 million in the first seven months of 2026. The town is repaving roads, renovating its senior center and restoring a historic opera house.

Data centers have existed for decades, Johnson notes; it is the growth of artificial intelligence, and its demand for computing power, that has turned them into a political issue, with some politicians now calling for construction moratoriums or outright bans. His counter is arithmetic. In Richland Parish, Louisiana, Meta's investment has funded annual teacher bonuses of 10,000 to 50,000 dollars, making the district a destination for talented educators. In Loudoun County, Virginia, data centers generate 45 percent of county revenue and have let officials cut homeowner property tax rates every year for a decade. Neighboring Henrico County put the revenue into a 60-million-dollar affordable housing trust fund for first-time buyers.

Johnson concedes the core of the backlash: families already struggling with higher utility bills. His answer is that the enormous, predictable demand from data centers finances new generation and grid investment by spreading infrastructure costs across a larger customer base — in Georgia, agreements involving new large electricity customers including OpenAI are projected to lower residential power bills. Newer facilities, he writes, are designed with closed-loop cooling and quieter operations to answer concerns about water and noise.

He also points to a proposal to pay homeowners "data center dividends" to counter the growing backlash. Every household would get a line on the same balance sheet that restored Ellendale's opera house.