WASHINGTON — Four Senate Democrats refused to block a GOP data center bill on Sept. 30, breaking with party leadership on an issue that's significantly shaping the campaign trail ahead of the upcoming midterm elections.
In one of their last votes before departing Washington until November, most Democrats derailed what they considered "toothless" legislation that Republicans argued would help shield Americans from spiking energy costs due to AI data centers.
The bill, called the Ratepayer Protection Act, previously passed the House of Representatives resoundingly, 417-3. It would require utility regulators at the state level to consider rules for data centers to "recover the full, incremental cost" of the power they need to operate. Even some of the House Democrats
who supported the measure have criticized that framework as imperfect.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said party leadership decided to prevent the bill from advancing because it didn't go nearly far enough. Democrats, he said, want to make it mandatory for data centers to fully financially shoulder their own power upgrades — but by law, "not by suggestion or hope or whim."
"This shoddy bill couldn't get any flimsier," Schumer said.
Despite those objections, four Democrats — including one in caucus leadership — tried to move the bill forward. Sens. Amy Klobuchar, of Minnesota; Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock, of Georgia; and Maggie Hassan, of New Hampshire, voted to advance it.
Ossoff, who's in a competitive Senate race in battleground Georgia, told USA TODAY afterward he thought the legislation was "worthy of debate."
"Thanks to Donald Trump, it costs more than ever in American history to power your home," he said.
The divisions underscored just how salient the backlash to data centers, and the AI debate more broadly, has become to the midterms. It also highlighted the challenges Congress is facing over the complexities of heeding growing calls to regulate AI.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune accused Democrats of trying to deny a political win to one of his most vulnerable incumbents running for reelection this fall. Sen. Jon Husted, who's in an ultracompetitive campaign in Ohio against former Sen. Sherrod Brown, sponsored the Senate version of the Ratepayer Protection Act.
"Given the overwhelming support for this measure in the House," Thune said, "it's difficult to conclude that Senate Democrats blocked this bill for any reason other than the desire to deny Republicans another win in an election year, which is a pretty poor reason."
Zachary Schermele is the congressional correspondent for USA TODAY. Reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com and on Signal @zachschermele.02. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Data center bill pushes four Senate Democrats to break ranks
