President Donald Trump convened a roundtable on the White House of the world’s leaders in expertise to announce the Ratepayer Protection Pledge.
“Under this new agreement, Big Tech companies are committing to fully cover the costs of increased electricity production required for AI data centers and that would be prices for American communities will not go up, but in many cases will actually come down very substantially because you know the data centers and you people are so big, you’re the — the biggest in the world,” Trump mentioned.
In signing the pledge, expertise firms, together with Google, Meta, OpenAI and XAI, amongst others, dedicated to deliver new power technology on-line, spend money on transmission upgrades, negotiate separate fee buildings and strengthen grid resilience. The firms additionally assured they’ll create jobs in native communities the place they construct data centers and set up packages to construct abilities among the many workforce.
America’s continued financial and technological management is determined by dependable, large-scale data centers constructed right here in America, according to the White House. The settlement introduced on Wednesday ensures the American folks is not going to foot the invoice.
“We have to lead in AI,” Trump mentioned. “And you can’t do that if you can’t build.”
David Sacks, Chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, warned of the Democrats’ opposition to AI infrastructure.
“Democrats, like Bernie Sanders … they just want to ban the data centers so they want to stop the economic growth. They want to stop the wage increases for blue collars. They want to stop the construction, they want to stop progress. That’s not the answer,” Sacks mentioned.
Meanwhile, Republican lawmakers in Tallahassee stand poised to just do that. Proposed payments in each the House and Senate are some of essentially the most restrictive measures within the nation when it comes to the construction of new data centers.
SB 484, Data Centers by Sen. Bryan Ávila, handed the Senate flooring final week. The invoice would prohibit nondisclosure agreements for personal firms wanting to make investments billions within the construction of a data heart.
Business leaders assert that confidentiality agreements are key to massive improvement tasks, permitting non-public firms to carry out due diligence and negotiate agreements with out revealing non-public info to their rivals. A ban on NDAs would successfully shut the door to data centers excited by coming to Florida.
The House companion goes a step additional, outlawing the construction of data centers inside 5 miles of a college in Florida, successfully ruling out a majority of the state as attainable places for these large non-public investments and important job creators.
HB 1007, Data Centers by Rep. Griff Griffitts, is positioned on Second Reading, awaiting a vote on the House flooring.
If Florida advances the proposed restrictions, data centers — together with the roles they create and hundreds of thousands in annual tax income they generate — will go to neighboring states.
U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson at Wednesday’s White House roundtable described the advantages data centers have introduced to Louisiana.
“Amazon is doing a big one. And our communities are so grateful to have that investment, and also grateful because they’re coming in as great corporate partners, community partners and they’re acting responsibly. They’re helping to build out the energy grid, and they’re making life better, not just with good paying jobs. They’re actually making life better in these communities and in our state.”