AUSTIN — Texas Democratic gubernatorial candidate Gina Hinojosa vowed Thursday to issue an immediate moratorium on all new data centers if elected, slamming Gov. Greg Abbott's handling of the Big Tech industry's rapid expansion across the Lone Star State.
Hinojosa made the pledge outside the Texas governor's mansion in Austin, holding a press conference designed to pressure Abbott into taking executive action before the Legislature reconvenes in January — and to draw attention to his refusal to debate her in the closing weeks of the campaign. Early voting begins Monday, with Election Day set for Nov. 3.
"Abbott's moratorium on data centers is just words," Hinojosa said, according to the Washington Examiner and the Texarkana Gazette. "We still have Texans who are having to fend for themselves against big economic powers in our communities because Greg Abbott invited the data centers into Texas with the richest tax breaks in the country."
The dispute has become a central issue in the governor's race as data centers — massive facilities powering the artificial intelligence boom — spread across Texas, sparking backlash from rural and suburban communities over electricity costs, water consumption, and noise.
Abbott responded Wednesday in a joint interview with The Dallas Morning News and NBC 5, saying he wants the Legislature to turn his restrictions into law when lawmakers return to Austin next year.
"We have to make sure that we turn my guidelines into law, and then we can figure out what the pathway forward is going to be," Abbott said.
The governor has called for data centers to pay for their own electrical infrastructure, use water-efficient cooling systems, report their electricity and water consumption, and limit noise disruptions. He also wants to eliminate sales tax breaks and other "unnecessary incentives" for the facilities.
"They must not invade our neighborhoods, whether it be in urban, suburban or rural settings," Abbott said.
Hinojosa, however, says Abbott's timeline is too slow. She points to a data center that went online last year in Joppa, a historically underserved Dallas neighborhood, as evidence that communities are already suffering.
But her record complicates the attack. In 2017, Hinojosa voted to continue data center incentives, saying the measure would allow contractors using American union labor to benefit from tax breaks without expanding the incentives overall — a vote Republicans are certain to highlight as the campaign enters its final stretch.
The broader political dynamic is striking. According to data cited by Democracy Now!, 75% of data centers under construction and 80% in the planning stages are located in predominantly Republican states — a fact that has created an unusual bipartisan backlash against the AI infrastructure boom.
In Tennessee, Democratic state Rep. Justin J. Pearson is running for Congress against Republican state Sen. Brent Taylor, campaigning against Elon Musk's xAI data centers near Memphis.
Even in Wisconsin, Republican gubernatorial candidates have joined the opposition to data centers, illustrating how the issue cuts across party lines and threatens to reshape local politics across the country.
For Texas voters, the stakes are tangible: rising utility bills, strained water supplies, and questions about whether the state is giving away too much to attract an industry that promises jobs but delivers enormous resource demands.
Abbott's allies argue his approach balances economic growth with accountability — forcing data centers to pay their fair share while keeping Texas competitive in the AI race against China and other global competitors. The governor's framework aims to protect homeowners and small businesses without driving investment to states with fewer guardrails.
Hinojosa's moratorium proposal raises its own questions: What happens to the thousands of construction jobs tied to existing projects? What signal does it send to companies considering Texas? And who fills the energy gap if data centers — which increasingly fund grid upgrades — are suddenly frozen out?
Our Take
Here's the truth the legacy media won't tell you: Gina Hinojosa isn't against data centers. She's against Texas winning.
This is the same Democrat who voted to continue the very tax incentives she now condemns. She voted to keep the breaks in 2017, and now she wants you to believe she's the one who will stand up to Big Tech? That's not a conversion. That's an election-year costume.
Abbott, by contrast, has laid out a real framework: make the data centers pay for their own infrastructure, use water-efficient systems, report consumption, and kill the sweetheart tax deals. That's not "just words." That's a plan that protects Texas homeowners and ratepayers while keeping the AI boom — and the jobs that come with it — right here in the Lone Star State.
And let's be clear about why this matters nationally. Roughly 80% of planned data centers are in red states. The Left isn't worried about your electricity bill. They're worried about the AI arms race — and who wins it. They want to slow-walk American innovation while China builds at full speed.
Patriots, the choice this November is simple: Texas can lead the AI revolution with common-sense protections for families, or we can hand the keys to a candidate who wants to freeze progress and call it compassion.
Do you trust the party that has spent years cheering on the Green New Deal to suddenly care about your power bills? Or do you trust the governor who's already putting real guardrails in place — and making the tech giants pay while they do business here?
The answer should be obvious. Early voting starts Monday. Get to the polls.
