Seven of the nine named AI builds in our coverage of 3 to 6 November sit in Texas, Georgia and Ohio, three of the four states where the Wall Street Journal said candidates promising to freeze data-center development won statehouses. The fourth is Michigan. By our count, that is 78% of the named builds, from OpenAI’s Stargate to Meta and the Tesla-SpaceX Terafab.
Analysts size the exposure in two different ways. Texas, Georgia and Ohio account for more than 40% of all planned US data-center capacity, according to Evercore ISI, the Journal reported. Goldman Sachs puts about 45% of planned US capacity in states likely to tighten data-center rules, with Texas alone about a quarter, investingLive reported.
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The key insight: As we read it, seven of the nine named AI builds in our coverage of 3 to 6 November sit in Texas, Georgia and Ohio, where the Wall Street Journal said candidates promising to freeze data-center development won statehouses; that is 78% of the named builds, by our count. Evercore ISI puts more than 40% of planned US capacity in those three states, the Journal reported.
Named builds in our coverage of 3 to 6 November 2026. Michigan has no named build in that coverage. The rows are not a complete list of US projects.
Among these rows, disclosed capacity in Texas is at least 3 GW: IREN’s 2GW Sweetwater Hub and Meta’s project of 1 GW or more, by our arithmetic. Outside the four states, SpaceX’s Arizona proposal is 6 GW at full build-out, per the applicant, and Google says its Wyoming campus is a $17 billion investment.
In Texas, Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa told CNN that “We will have laws to protect Texans, and we need to stop what we are doing with data centers until we have those protections”, Reuters reported. In a 22 October video she said: “When I am governor I will issue a moratorium โ a ban โ on all data center approvals until laws can be passed by the Legislature to protect Texans”, The Texas Tribune reported. She takes office on 19 January, 74 days from 6 November, by our arithmetic.
She said she spoke to the head of the Texas Parks & Wildlife Department to “request that no action be taken” on public land near SpaceX’s Starbase during her transition, Bloomberg reported. On Musk’s companies she said: “We can have a strong working relationship with Elon Musk and his companies, but it has to be on our terms”, in a clip of the CNN interview.
A governor-elect who made data centers a campaign issue, whom she did not name, asked Meta for a meeting after the inauguration, Meta’s president said. The Washington Examiner noted that Amy Acton in Ohio and Keisha Lance Bottoms in Georgia campaigned on restricting new data centers and won.
What the Ballots and the Analysts Said
Limits on data centers led in 40 of the 41 local measures on Ballotpedia’s 3 November list, on unofficial counts, as we reported. In Ohio, limits passed on 17 of the state’s 21 measures, by our count of the Cincinnati Enquirer’s lists, as we reported.
A summary of a Goldman Sachs note, posted on X by the Walter Bloomberg account, said Texas, Georgia and Michigan “could introduce restrictions on tax breaks, electricity, water and environmental permits”, and that Goldman “expects any moratoria to be short-lived”. Texas’s quarter of planned capacity is about 56% of Goldman’s 45%, by our arithmetic. Evercore’s and Goldman’s figures are different measures from different firms, and we do not add them.
As we read the table, Texas carries most of the rows: five of the seven named builds in the four states, with at least 3 GW of disclosed capacity, by our arithmetic.
As we read the two analyst figures, they measure different things: Evercore’s covers three named states, Goldman’s covers states it judges likely to tighten rules, and we do not add them.
As we read the governors’ statements, the words so far are about protections and approvals; no order has been issued, and Hinojosa takes office on 19 January.
Gina Hinojosa, Texas Governor-elect, to CNN, as reported by Reuters
“We will have laws to protect Texans, and we need to stop what we are doing with data centers until we have those protections”
Three Implications
FOR AI BUILDERS WITH SITES IN THESE STATES Seven of the nine named builds in our coverage sit in Texas, Georgia and Ohio, by our count.
FOR READERS WEIGHING THE EXPOSURE Evercore ISI’s over-40% and Goldman’s about-45% are different measures from different firms, as reported.
FOR TIMING Hinojosa takes office on 19 January; no company in the table has said it will move or cancel a project.
The framework says: “Companies that solve the power equation will dominate the AI era; those that don’t will watch their chips sit idle.”
As we read it, where a campus can get approved is now part of that power equation. The framework does not discuss these states, governors or projects.
What Is Not Established
The nine rows are the named builds in our own coverage, not a census of US projects, so the 78% describes our coverage, not the market. No company in the table has said it will move or cancel a project, and no governor-elect has issued an order; Hinojosa takes office on 19 January. Capacity figures are not disclosed for most rows, and the Arizona and Wyoming projects are not in states the Journal listed.
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Seven of nine named AI builds in our coverage sit in Texas, Georgia and Ohio, where candidates promising data-center freezes won statehouses, the Journal reported; Evercore ISI puts more than 40% of planned US capacity in those three states. Texas, with at least 3 GW of the disclosed capacity in our table, has a governor-elect who has said the state must stop what it is doing with data centers until protections are in place.
A note on sourcing. This piece compiles facts from our coverage of 3 to 6 November 2026, each linked and attributed there: Reuters and the Texas Tribune on Gina Hinojosa, Bloomberg on Starbase, the Wall Street Journal on the governor races, OpenAI and Meta sites and Evercore ISI’s figure, Goldman Sachs via investingLive and X, Ballotpedia’s unofficial counts, company filings and applicants’ documents. The count of named builds, the 78%, the capacity sum and the 56% are our arithmetic.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
