Where do Minnesota candidates stand on data centers?
Data center development has become a significant campaign issue in Minnesota's gubernatorial and U.S. Senate races, with candidates outlining their stances on local control, energy costs, water usage, and non-disclosure agreements. While some past legislation related to data centers has been successfully passed, recent efforts to ban NDAs and enact moratoriums have failed, highlighting ongoing legislative challenges and political divisions.
The future of hyperscale data centers in Minnesota has emerged as a key issue in the current gubernatorial and U.S. Senate campaigns, prompting candidates to articulate their positions on managing such projects. While a standalone data center bill passed in 2025, introducing environmental regulations and adjusting sales tax exemptions on electricity, more recent bipartisan efforts in the 2026 legislative session, such as banning non-disclosure agreements (NDAs) for local governments, ultimately failed. Other proposals, including tax breaks and eased permitting, as well as data center moratoriums, also did not advance.
Candidates for governor, including Republican Lisa Demuth and U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar, largely agree on the importance of local input. Demuth, a Republican, supports signing legislation to ban NDAs and emphasizes protecting Minnesotans' energy bills, although her stance on state environmental regulation remains unclear. Klobuchar, a Democrat, stresses strong state standards and local control, advocating for developers to cover 100% of energy and grid costs, disclose electricity and water demands, and provide annual public reports on these figures. She also asserts that communities should have the final say on data center projects.
In the U.S. Senate race, Lt. Gov. Peggy Flanagan, a Democrat, also emphasizes local decision-making and banning NDAs, additionally advocating for union labor and adherence to Minnesota's environmental standards. Republican Michele Tafoya echoes the sentiment that projects must benefit local communities and ensure residents are not burdened with costs. She calls for developers to be transparent about incentives and how they will cover project-created costs. Notably, none of the four candidates expressed support for a statewide or federal moratorium on data center construction, reflecting the challenges faced by such legislation in the recent session. A public poll indicates significant citizen support for moratoriums or outright bans on data centers.