There's an issue emerging in the political world that -- so far -- has not adequately been addressed by either party. This means there is a big opportunity for one of them to jump onto the populist side of the issue and get out in front of a growing amount of rage among some voters. So far, though, neither party seems all that interested, meaning the deep pockets of the industry leaders might win out over how average voters see the issue. So far, the only politician positioning himself on the side of average people is (no real surprise) Senator Bernie Sanders. Everyone else, to one extent or another, seems to be either supporting or ignoring the impact of new data centers being built all across the country.

Data centers are buildings that house rack after rack of computers. This concentration of computing power is currently necessary to run the artificial intelligence programs that are increasing their reach into people's lives in a big way. The problem is that most people are not really benefiting from this explosion of a new computing industry -- least of all, those who have to live next to the new data centers being built.

Let's start with a few basics. Data centers are, for the most part, large and mostly featureless buildings that are constructed to house as many computers as possible. Building them means providing short-term construction jobs (while they are being built), but they require very few actual long-term jobs to run. The computers themselves generate an enormous amount of heat, so the buildings have to have massive cooling systems. These cooling systems can be incredibly loud, and they usually use an enormous amount of water. The data centers also use up an enormous amount of electricity as well.

Building all this new infrastructure for the A.I. revolution hasn't really improved average people's lives all that much, at least not so far. What it has done is give rise to a very real fear that A.I. is going to start wiping out millions of jobs that actual human beings do today. And a lot of the jobs A.I. may take over are good jobs -- not menial or unskilled labor. The fear of massive layoffs in all kinds of different industries is very real, although the technology is still so new that such massive layoffs haven't so far materialized in any across-the-board way. Even so, it is seen as only a matter of time before they arrive.

As you can see, the benefits to average people are (so far) very limited in nature, while the downsides are very real and seem to be growing. Which is why it could all emerge as a very potent political issue.

Data centers are being built just about everywhere these days. They're popping up in cities, in suburbs, and out in rural America. The companies who build data centers have a few basic requirements: access to a lot of water, access to a lot of electricity, and land that is as cheap as possible. All three are giving rise to conflicts, as one group fighting back explains:

"This data center expansion affects so many issues," said Mitch Jones, managing director of policy and litigation at Food and Water Watch. The group last month organized a letter signed by several national advocacy groups demanding a moratorium.

"It takes up farmland in rural communities. It takes up dwindling water sources in communities that need cleaner drinking water. And it is driving up electricity prices for everyone," he said. "It is drawing together people from disparate backgrounds who might not agree on other political issues. They are saying this is taking place without any forethought to communities and we must stop it."

Big companies searching for places to build data centers have been highly secretive. They contact the local politicians and make their presentations, then demand non-disclosure agreements so that word of the project won't leak out to the public -- the exact opposite of "open government." They promise a big boost in localities' tax bases and downplay any possible problems. They push to get land re-zoned to allow big industrial sites in places that have never seen such uses before -- both in rural communities and in suburbs (on land right next to people's houses). Here's just one example:

The industry has struggled to quell the concerns. In Chandler, Arizona, former senator Kyrsten Sinema (I), co-founder of the AI Infrastructure Coalition, implored city officials to get on board with a large proposed project or risk the federal government pushing it through without city input.

The city council rejected the project unanimously.

The vote followed the Tucson City Council's unanimous rejection of a plan that would have required annexing land in the Sonoran Desert that until June had been zoned "rural homestead." Some voters were outraged that local officials had signed a five-year nondisclosure agreement with Amazon, which did not come to light for two years. Frustration with the power company that would have provided the power has fueled a movement to drive it out in favor of a community-led nonprofit.

Here's another example, from a Maryland county right next to Washington D.C., where a massive data center proposal is being considered for land that previously was used for a large shopping mall (now shuttered):

"I feel it's going to affect all of us as residents and as a whole," said Frazier McCollum, who lives within one mile of the Landover Mall site and is behind a movement to stop the nearly 90-acre plot from being converted to a "hyperscale" data center that would feature five buildings and use 820 megawatts of electricity, enough to power 656,000 homes at any given time.

Frazier McCollum's June petition against the project has raked in more than 21,000 signatures and kicked off an online fury that spilled over into a data center task force meeting in September that was disrupted by angry residents. In October, residents again yelled at local elected officials over the proposal and what they said was a lack of transparency about it.

Think about that for a moment. One 90-acre site is going to use the same amount of electricity that over 650,000 homes would use. And that's just one of these data centers. The rising price consumers pay for electricity is already becoming a very potent political issue, and the data centers are driving a whole lot of the increased demand for electricity. This means that voters see skyrocketing electrical bills while they worry about whether their job is going to disappear soon. It's pretty easy to see why the outrage against this A.I. gold rush stretches from deep-blue majority-Black communities out to deep-red farm towns.

The problem for the politicians is that the A.I. gold rush is actually driving the U.S. economy right now. If you take away all the investment in A.I. over the past year, the economy isn't doing all that great. A.I. investment has driven up the stock market and driven up all the economic indicators (since they're all averages across the entire economy). It's a real boom time for A.I., so much so that plenty of economists are increasingly worried about what might happen if this bubble bursts (the way the dot-com bubble collapsed, a few decades ago). But for now the politicians (for the most part) have all gotten on the A.I. gravy train, which pretty much requires them to turn a blind eye to any negative consequences.

Meanwhile, more data centers are being proposed, planned, and built. They are sucking up an enormous amount of clean water and electricity, to the detriment of people who live near the site and who now have to pay more for both (or even face shortages). They are noisy and they run 24 hours a day. And they don't even provide all that many jobs to local communities.

The article I first cited (above) is titled: "The Data Center Rebellion Is Here, And It's Reshaping The Political Landscape." It predicts the issue of data centers is going to be huge in this year's midterm elections. I'm not sure about that -- the issue may not have affected enough people in each congressional district to shift voting patterns -- but it certainly is a growing issue for many voters. And, so far, only politicians like Bernie Sanders are on the side of the outraged voters who have directly been affected. Will either party eventually realize the political potency of the issue? Or will the big corporations buy all of them up to the point that nobody in Washington even wants to talk about it?

I don't have the answer to that, but the outrage is real and it is growing. Here's a quote from the end of that article, which seems a good place to end this column on as well:

"I don't care how much chocolate icing you put on a dog turd, it don't make it chocolate cake," said Rick Plummer, who raises elite team-roping horses next to the proposed data center. "They are trying to fluff this data center thing up and say, 'Man, eat this birthday cake.' But it isn't birthday cake."

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant