Data center backlash echoes fossil-fuel politics

AxiosAugust 14, 2026en

Willie Nelson has become an unlikely barometer of America's biggest infrastructure fights. He once protested the Keystone XL pipeline and fracking. Today, he's fighting data centers. Why it matters: The American icon's latest cause underscores how the politics surrounding AI infrastructure are beginning to resemble the last decade's fights over fossil fuels. "The last thing we need is a loud, water thieving, light polluting, data center anywhere near our town (or any others for that matter)," Nelson told his more than one million Instagram followers recently. Flashback: "For 29 years, corporations have continued to take the land away from the small family farmers, and this is what we're here

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