Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear says the Trump administration kept him out of the loop last month as it rolled out plans for a $100 billion data center campus on federal land in his state — sidelining the red-state Democrat as he weighs a presidential run.
In an interview with POLITICO, Beshear said he has some “complaints” about the project. Namely, nobody from the White House, Department of Energy or NextEra Energy or Brookfield Asset Management — the energy and financial powerhouses funding the project — briefed him on the massive investment before making it public at the end of July.
Beshear’s claim of a communications kerfuffle — if it wasn’t a sharp-elbowed attempt by the White House to box out an ambitious Democratic governor, who said he could decide on a presidential run as soon as December — underscores the jockeying in Rust Belt states to take credit for local investment stemming from the U.S. tech industry’s spending spree. At the same time, it could also distance Beshear from a project that would dwarf most U.S. data centers today at a moment of growing public unease over the infrastructure build-out to advance artificial intelligence.
The proposed Paducah American Energy Hub would be on a 3,500-acre Department of Energy site that enriched uranium during the Cold War. The private-sector consortium aims to build enough on-site natural gas generation and large-scale battery capacity to power one of the largest data center campuses in the United States — roughly enough power for 3 million homes.
In the interview Friday, Beshear acknowledged that the Department of Energy had notified the governor’s office: A project would be announced on July 29.
“I was not briefed on it. I had gotten notice that there would be an announcement and that it was a data center announcement,” Beshear said. “But at no point did the companies come and talk about the scope, the power demands, how they were going to be met, designs that could reduce or eliminate — hopefully — environmental issues.”
“Those are the types of things that we want to talk through with any data center project,” Beshear added.
In a statement, a DOE spokesperson said: “The Energy Department provided notifications to members of the Governor’s office the week prior to the announcement and again the week of the announcement. This is standard practice.”
When asked for comment, the White House referred POLITICO to DOE.
The project consortium, which includes three local utilities serving western Kentucky, told POLITICO it’s committed to working with “all stakeholders.”
“We are confident that the project, which builds on Paducah’s energy legacy, will benefit the local community and Kentucky,” the project group said. “We have reached out to the governor’s office to schedule time and look forward to engaging constructively with him and the community as a whole.”
Still, the snub comes at a delicate time. Beshear signed an executive order last Thursday that set basic standards for data centers and directed utility regulators to ensure Kentuckians don’t pay more for electricity.
Beshear’s order comes after a suite of policy proposals and political maneuvers that Democratic governors and the party’s statewide candidates are rolling out to address public concern about data centers.
In the Ohio Senate race, Democrat Sherrod Brown, the former three-term senator running to unseat Republican Sen. Jon Husted, launched an ad campaign labeling Husted the “face of data centers in Ohio.” It accused him of “cutting sweetheart tax deals” for tech companies during his time as lieutenant governor.
Democratic governors are being buffeted by opposing forces: pressure to attract deep-pocketed technology companies that can pay for infrastructure and create jobs versus a voting public anxious about AI, the scale of data center development and its effect on power prices, communities, and the environment. That’s reflected in polling and populist candidates on the left and right calling for moratoriums and regulations.
In Pennsylvania, developers are planning 74 new data centers — which, if built, would consume the energy equivalent of 22 large nuclear power plants. Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro, also considering a presidential run in 2028, has sought a middle ground: championing data center investment while pressing power companies and the regional grid operators, PJM Interconnection, to cap the rise of electricity prices. In July, Shapiro signed a budget deal directing data centers to report their energy and water use.
Meanwhile, in New York, Gov. Kathy Hochul went even further in July by declaring the nation’s first state-level moratorium on the construction of large data centers.
‘Paying for all your own power’
In recent weeks, Beshear has waded deeper into the politics swirling around the nationwide deluge of data center projects.
“You’re not coming to Kentucky unless you’re paying for all your own power. Not a penny of that’s going to go on our ratepayers,” Beshear told POLITICO.
Beshear said issues were piling up. Surrounded by colorful fabrics at Paducah’s National Quilt Museum, the governor leaned back in his chair and crossed one leg over the other.
“We’ve had a number that have applied for permits,” Beshear said. “You have a lot of counties that have issued moratoriums until they learn more.”
His executive order, the governor said, “creates a baseline” for counties to start a conversation with developers. Data centers cannot “negatively impact” the state’s water and air quality, the order says, and it directs the Public Service Commission to block utilities from raising rates to recover costs for projects caused by data centers.
Kent Chandler, a former Kentucky PSC chair appointed by Beshear, said limits on the governor’s influence over commission actions won’t make it easy to enforce the executive order.
“The order is more politics than substance,” Chandler said. “For instance, the PSC is under no obligation to adhere to the executive order, and the PSC can’t use the EO as the basis of its decisions the way it can statutes, regulations or its own precedent.”
Beshear’s executive order would also require any data center developer to issue an energy plan to state agencies directly under Beshear that regulate energy and the environment.
“At most the Energy and Environment Cabinet could arguably hold up permits for infrastructure needed for certain data center projects — or the utilities’ power plants to serve them — if they don’t follow the executive order,” said Chandler, now a nonresident senior fellow at the center-right R Street Institute.
“But using the order as the basis for denial without any further regulations by the Energy and Environment Cabinet would put those permit denials on shaky legal ground,” Chandler added.
Bob Babbage, a lobbyist and former Democratic secretary of state in Kentucky, noted how quickly data centers have taken center stage in local and state politics.
“Lexington and Louisville, big cities, other smaller places, medium-sized places in the state: everybody’s looking at, thinking about, hearing feedback from taxpayers about data centers — and much of it is expressing great concern.”
Babbage also faulted the decision by NextEra, Brookfield and local companies sponsoring the energy and data center project in Paducah to keep Beshear from receiving detailed information.
“Data center backers should know it’s common sense that every governor needs all the information possible as soon as possible,” Babbage said.
‘Ideal spot for a mega-data center’
In Paducah, residents POLITICO spoke with say they’re uneasy about the planned $100 billion data center and energy hub.
“Prices are already so high right now, and the harm to the environment and water: that’s what worries me,” Paducah resident Jackie Riley said while waiting for the start of an evening concert on the banks of the Ohio River. “Gov. Beshear’s passing some laws, though, to make them do what they say. I appreciate that. I appreciate him.”
The government site — where DOE operated the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant starting in the 1950s — is still partially contaminated with radioactive isotopes as cleanup efforts continue. But proponents of industrial development there point to existing high-voltage power lines and other infrastructure.
“The DOE site is the ideal spot for a mega data center,” said Paducah Mayor George Bray, who switched party affiliation from Republican to independent in 2025. “The infrastructure that is built out there is capable of handling all the needs.”
Bray cited the nearby Ohio River as a source of water for cooling. “Plus, it’s out in the middle of nowhere,” meaning there are fewer residents who could be disturbed by construction or operation, he said.
“That land is probably the best place to put a data center because it is already ruined by the gaseous diffusion plant,” said Michael McVicker, a Democratic candidate for a Kentucky House seat from the area.
The 26-year-old still has deep concerns, though, including who will ultimately use the data center. Sitting in the Etcetera Squared coffee shop in downtown Paducah, McVicker contrasted chatbot use by the likes of Google with more concerning possibilities, such as supporting the AI Flock Safety uses for its controversial cameras that read license plates and map people’s travel routes.
“I don’t want Paducah to be the home of mass surveillance,” McVicker said.
While the server farm pushed by DOE would probably be the region’s largest, Bray said other developers are “testing the waters” to build new or expand existing data centers in the area.
But as for the Brookfield-NextEra plan, Beshear said he doesn’t have enough information to declare his support or opposition. The fate of an energy and AI project of this size, he added, should hinge on the perspective of people in western Kentucky.
“I don’t believe that the federal government or the state government should be the end-all ‘yes’ to a data center or should be the end-all ‘no,’” the governor said. “This is a very local decision, and it should be made by localities, but within certain parameters — with the right guardrails.”
