MORNING RANT: The Data Center Wars - A Massive Proposed Data Center in Texas Drops Request for Tax Abatements

There is an intense political battle about data centers right now, with Democrats and their media allies lining up in opposition to their construction, while President Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance promote this industrial building boom and its importance to the country. Vance does an excellent job explaining that America needs to be at the forefront of the technology revolution, and that data centers that produce their own electricity make great neighbors, without impacting electricity rates.

I, too, strongly endorse the construction of privately-funded data centers, powered by on-site plants generating electricity from natural gas, but as I’ve previously written, ”I do not support the construction of data centers for which tax abatements, incentive payments, and subsidized utilities must be paid by taxpayers. In the raging battle between pro-data center and anti-data center forces, the two sides may not even be talking about the same thing. It is understandable that many of those who oppose data centers are skeptical, given the horrendous track record of corporate welfare, corporate cronyism, and taxpayer-funded industrial boondoggles they’ve been forced to pay for.”

If taxpayers feel there is a binary choice between either banning economic progress, like several blue states have done with data centers, or subsidizing it, like Republican elected officials reflexively do, you can expect exhausted taxpayers to be opposed to such “economic development.” The message seems to be getting through to data center developers that the era of taxpayer-subsidized industrial development has played out. Rather than make demands on communities, the developers are starting to realize they need to promise to improve the communities where they’ll be building, without subsidization.

Near Austin, in Bastrop County, Texas, a massive (2,800 acre) proposed data center faced strong community opposition because it sought not only a 100% tax abatement from property taxes, but it also sought an abatement from emergency services taxes too. The Pacifico Energy project sought to take services from the community through 2038 without paying any taxes for the services they’d be using.

The message is finally getting through…

“Bastrop County Data Center Developer Drops Tax Break Requests, Says It Will Pay Full Property Taxes” [KVUE – 08/20/2026]

Pacifico Energy told KVUE it made the decision after hearing concerns from residents. “We withdrew our Chapter 312 and JETI applications because we heard the community clearly,” the company said in a statement. “The Cedar Creek Campus is not seeking any tax incentives and will pay its property taxes in full, like any other taxpayer in Bastrop County.”

The change was welcomed by some residents who have opposed the project. Josh Mincher, a Red Rock resident, said taxes were one of the community's primary concerns.

This is great news – just build it without taxpayer subsidization. In addition, Pacifico will build its own natural-gas fired electricity generating plant on the site.

Another issue facing data center developers is the enmity that the tech industry has earned. During the great awokening, the tech bros were happy to be a censor of forbidden opinions while jamming the woke agenda down our throats. Tech has subsequently embraced an unpatriotic purging of American labor to be replaced by cheap foreign labor, either by offshoring, or by importing foreign H-1B labor. On top of that, many industry leaders engaged in naïve and destructive crowing about how AI will eliminate millions of jobs. They dug themselves a deep hole.

But what is great is that the tech industry has now come to realize that despite their “clean energy” posturing during peak-woke, there is no way to power their future without abundant, reliable energy that can only be provided by fossil fuels or nuclear energy. I welcome their rejection of green energy, the core tenet of the Church of Climate.

I’m excited for the tech industry to be my ally in the war on the globalist climate cult, and this is a start. In addition, if “my team” is going to support tech building data centers, while also getting reliable electricity from fossil fuels, my team will also have leverage to make tech start being better corporate citizens who prioritize America and fellow Americans.

Returning to the Pacifico Energy data center in Texas, I applaud the local residents for being opposed to subsidizing it, and I applaud Pacifico for proceeding without subsidization, while also building a new power plant powered by fossil fuels.

[buck.throckmorton at protonmail dot com]

posted by Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM

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