Jackie McGuire never planned on running for public office.
She is, first of all, a self-labeled “liberal with pink hair”. She is also “covered in tattoos” and dresses like “an unsupervised 10-year-old” — three traits that many would consider obstacles to a successful political career in Marana, Arizona, a right-leaning town north of Tucson.
McGuire’s plans changed when Marana’s town council unanimously agreed to approve a 600-acre data center project in late 2025.
Before her political career began, McGuire worked as a cybersecurity expert and a research analyst specifically covering data centers and AI infrastructure. With that background, and what she perceived to be a deeper understanding of data centers than the council members representing her, she decided to speak out against the project at a council meeting last December.
“This is a financially unsustainable project,” she said in her remarks.
Those remarks were recorded and posted to Instagram by No Desert Data Centers, a local activist organization. And as the views flooded in, McGuire’s municipal political career was born almost overnight.
Just eight months later, the flamboyantly-dressed liberal was elected to the town council.
“I think the reason that I was elected is because people know me as ‘the data center person,’” McGuire said. “Some of the funniest comments I saw on social media were things like, ‘I can't believe I'm going to have to vote for a liberal with pink hair just to stop this stupid data center.’ So, I think there were definitely people who would never have voted for me otherwise.”
Her story is indicative of a wider backlash against data centers and the AI industry as a whole playing out across Arizona, and the country at large.
So could McGuire’s story — that of a politician winning on a platform of data center and AI regulation — repeat itself in local and federal races in the 2026 midterms?
A bipartisan issue
A recent poll from Equis Research found that over two thirds of Arizona voters would support measures making it harder for data centers to be built in their area. That number mirrors nationwide polling from the Associated Press.
There are a number of reasons why people are concerned about data center development. They use significant amounts of energy and water, and generate heat and noise that can be a nuisance to communities.
On the other hand, proponents say they create jobs and bring in significant amounts of tax revenue for the communities in which they are built. Plus, they argue, if you use the internet and social media, you’re already using data centers.
Mike Noble, founder of Noble Predictive Insights, a pollster based in Phoenix, says the issue is fairly bipartisan.
“Basically what we found is that in general on AI or data center topics, Republicans are basically split on it — they're split or just slightly negative. And you look at independents and Democrats, they're both very much against them,” Noble said.
That trend holds for politicians. Even diametrically opposed representatives have found common ground on the issue.
"What is our plan? Do we want to be the data center capital of the world? The vast majority of Arizonans that I am talking with say absolutely not."Kris Mayes, Arizona Attorney General
In one unlikely alliance, Steve Bannon, former chief strategist for President Trump, backed a proposal by Democratic Socialists Alexandra Ocasio Cortes and Bernie Sanders to ban the construction of new data centers.
Closer to home, Republican gubernatorial candidate Andy Biggs has said that he essentially agrees with his opponent, Democratic incumbent Katie Hobbs, when it comes to limiting tax breaks for data centers.
Pete Seat, Vice President of the Bose Public Affairs Group and an adjunct professor of political science at the University of Arizona, said the apparent interparty agreement is a political tactic.
“Politicians know how to read polls, and when they read polling that shows the anxiety with artificial intelligence, objections to data centers or other development projects, they're not going to go the courageous route,” Seat said. “They're going to go the political route, particularly when we're this close to an election cycle.”
Even President Trump, who just last month said communities who resisted data centers would “end up backwards and poor,” has begun to call for data centers to supply their own power and give back more to local communities.
According to Seat, it’s much easier for politicians to stand by a vote against a data center project than it is to stand by a vote for one. But in his opinion, many of those politicians will reverse their stance once they are no longer on the ballot.
“I would say at least half of these candidates and politicians who are taking up anti-AI, anti-data center, anti-development stances today to earn votes, if they're in decision making positions after January, 50 percent of them are going to end up voting the opposite way,” he said.
Candidates spar over data centers in Corporation Commission, Attorney General races
In many competitive midterm races though, candidates are not in agreement — especially in Arizona.
One such race is the Arizona Corporation Commission (ACC) election. The ACC oversees the cost of power in Arizona — which involves determining who pays for the new grid capacity that data centers require. Two seats are up for grabs this year.
Democrats Jonathon Hill and Clara Pratte have alleged that Republican incumbent Kevin Thompson has done little to protect Arizonans from higher energy prices due to data center development.
In the Corporation Commission debate last month, Hill attacked Thompson and the Commission’s record on data centers.
“The commission was completely unprepared for the data center issue,” he said. “They did not do their homework, they did not see these things coming until we already had quite a few built, and the communities around them realized what they were doing.”
The ACC came under fire in early October after data analyst Abhay Padgaonkar claimed the commission let Phoenix’s power company, APS, pass nearly $600 million in extra energy costs on to Phoenix residents. He says those costs were driven by data centers.
Hill, Pratte and Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes have called for an independent investigation into the allegations. The ACC and APS have called Padgaonkar’s findings misleading, saying he overlooked other causes of increased costs.
Mayes is also up for re-election, and data center policy was a key topic in her debate with Republican candidate Warren Petersen. Petersen supports the ongoing development of data centers, while Mayes has called for a statewide moratorium.
In their September debate, Mayes blamed data centers for the rate increases sought by Tucson Electric Power and APS, and said Arizonans as a whole are opposed to them.
“The vast majority of Arizonans want to see us take a step back and think about a plan,” she said in the debate. “What is our plan? Do we want to be the data center capital of the world? The vast majority of Arizonans that I am talking with say absolutely not. And they want to have a say.”
Mayes has also criticized the Corporation Commission’s decisions, particularly its sign-off on an energy deal between Tucson Electric Power and Beale Infrastructure to provide electricity for the Project Blue data center being built in Pima County.
AI PACs spend big in AZ Congressional races
Arizona’s two closely-contested House races have seen an influx of spending by political action committees on both sides of the data center debate.
In the state’s 1st Congressional District, pro-AI super PACs have spent over $1 million in support of Jay Feely, a Republican and former NFL kicker. Feely said in a recent debate that data centers “should be welcomed.”
One of Feely’s supporters is a PAC called American Mission — which is funded almost exclusively by Leading the Future, a PAC backed by Silicon Valley billionaires Mark Andreessen, Ben Horowitz and Open-AI co-founder Greg Brockman. Leading the Future is associated with Open-AI and generally opposes guardrails to the technology.
Guardrails Alliance, a super PAC in support of greater AI regulation, has spent over $400,000 on attack ads against Feely in defense of his Democratic opponent, Amish Shah, who has said he opposes building data centers in CD1.
Tech tycoon Elon Musk has also thrown his weight behind Arizona’s Republican House candidates. Musk’s America PAC spent nearly $482,000 in support of Feely, and over $400,000 in support of Juan Ciscomani, the Republican incumbent in the race for Arizona’s 6th Congressional District.
Meanwhile, a new Democrat-aligned super PAC called Tomorrow Together has spent over $4 million dollars across four key House races nationwide to attack Republican candidates who have opposed greater regulation on AI. Ciscomani is one of their chosen targets.
Ciscomani backed a House proposal last year to prevent states from regulating the AI industry. When it comes to data centers though, his campaign’s stance is similar to that of his opponent, Democrat JoAnna Mendoza. Both say they support making data center developers supply and pay for their own energy.
A cause for public investment in local politics
In Marana, the proposed data center became the defining issue of the entire town council race. That race ultimately became the most expensive on record, with candidates spending a combined $400,000, largely on attack ads — despite the town council being a nonpartisan race.
According to McGuire, her opposition to the project was so popular that opponents had to resort to partisan attacks to compete.
“What they tried to do was tie me to as many extreme partisan issues as they could because they knew that the data center support was going to get me elected,” she said. “I think what you’re seeing is because of that, it’s actually causing politics to get more partisan.”
Nevertheless, McGuire said she believed that the public’s concern about data centers is a good thing for politics.
“The positive thing that I see coming out of this is that more people in my town are paying attention to local government than ever have before. More people are showing up for meetings, more people are reaching out and asking me for, you know, asking for information. So, I'm hoping this is the thing that causes people to check back in.”
The story of McGuire’s election could be an anomaly, but it could also be a sign of what’s to come as the AI industry’s need for computing power continues to expand. Either way, next week Arizona voters will reveal just how important the future of data centers is to them.
