Outgoing Gov. Brian Kemp (R-GA) on Wednesday cautioned Georgians against embracing Democratic gubernatorial nominee Keisha Lance Bottoms, warning her position on data centers threatens the state’s economy.
Kemp weighed in on the heated governor’s race, which will feature Bottoms against either Lt. Gov. Burt Jones or businessman Rick Jackson on the Republican side in November, during an interview with Bloomberg Television. The term-limited governor expressed concern about Bottoms’ proposal to impose a moratorium on data center development if she wins the election, arguing that Georgia has the energy capacity it needs to grow responsibly, without raising electricity rates for residents.
“That’s just an insane position to take, because you know, I was down in Early County, Georgia, it’s one of the poorest counties in the United States of America, and they, as soon as I got out of the car, were coming to me, going, ‘Please help us with our data center, we want to build a data center here,’” he said. “‘We know that will provide good-paying jobs for our community,’ because they just had a sawmill shut down, and they know that it’ll be good for helping them reduce property taxes.
Kemp said he is against putting data centers everywhere, explaining he is not for “pushing them in communities where the local governments and the people don’t want it.”
“But there are many places around the state where people do want it, and that’s where we need to work with them,” Kemp added. “So, I think it’s irresponsible for Keisha Lance Bottoms to say freeze construction … wanting to put moratoriums on growth and business and driving the economy.”
His comments come as Georgia has become one of the fast-growing markets for data centers in the country. Critics, such as Bottoms, believe the state has “absolutely moved too fast” on data centers and express fears that they are draining natural resources such as water and raising utility bills. Bottoms told WANF-TV in April that “As governor, I’m going to ask for a moratorium,” and said she wanted a report to assess the situation before moving forward with further projects.
“When you have communities that are saying I’m concerned about this happening in my community, I’m concerned about it happening in my backyard, you have to listen to that,” she said during another interview with the Ledger-Enquirer in early April. “If I had the privilege of being elected governor, I am going to ask for a pause in construction on data centers throughout the state. Give us an opportunity to understand exactly where we are. Are we on the right track, or do we need to scale back?”
Georgia ranks fourth globally in data centers, with $4.6 billion in AI-related venture capital invested across 368 deals, according to the American Edge Project. Amazon, Google, and Meta have been attracted to the Peach State, while QTS holds a 99-acre data center campus in northwest Atlanta. The state’s largest city has a bigger percentage increase in data construction than anywhere else in the country, according to CBRE.
Kemp said this week that the state’s energy grid holds the capacity to support the growth, pushing back on concerns that data centers will drain the supply. He said that Georgia power companies are on track to lower rates and return money to taxpayers, even as they continue to build out to meet demand.
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“I know that is hard to believe, because that is not happening anywhere else in the rest of the country, which is why our story is so compelling,” the governor said.
“We’ve got a great rate structure from Georgia Public Service Commission,” he added. “The Georgia General Assembly, along with our power producers like Georgia Power, have put a structure in that as we build the generation out, and they’re going to do that by half of what they have now, just in the next less than 10 years, which is pretty incredible that a state can do that to meet the demands of its customers, but also making them pay for that build out and tying that into rates long term.”