Voters in American towns and counties turned down data center development almost everywhere they were asked on November 3. According to Ballotpedia, 41 local ballot measures in 10 states dealt with the large computer buildings that run artificial intelligence services, through bans, temporary pauses, rezoning requests and nonbinding advisory questions. With most results counted on Wednesday, CNBC and Scientific American reported that voters sided against data centers in every case but one. In Wells, Maine, more than 80 percent approved a 180-day pause on data center construction that also applies to projects already proposed. The single exception was Harwood, North Dakota, where voters rejected, by about three to one, a proposal requiring extra review of industrial projects, data centers included. A $3 billion data center is already being built near the town.

The local votes came alongside races in which the buildings were a campaign issue. In a CNBC voter poll, 56 percent of voters said data centers were a crucial or major factor in their decision. Ohio’s incoming governor, Amy Acton, supports a conditional moratorium that would require new data centers to pay all of their utility costs and to be built with union labor, a position that could slow a large computing site planned by OpenAI, Nvidia and SoftBank in southern Ohio. The tallies are still unofficial. In towns that approved bans or pauses, developers will have to wait out the moratoriums or persuade voters to change the rules.