Wired's report examines the fast-growing backlash against AI data centres sweeping across the United States, focusing on Georgia as a hotspot of resistance. The piece follows Joe Allen, an anti-tech commentator who gained prominence on Steve Bannon's War Room podcast, as the author explores how opposition to data centre construction is uniting people from opposite ends of the political spectrum, from tech-sceptic populists to environmental campaigners, in what the writer describes as a near-religious fury rarely seen in energy and environmental reporting.

The article traces how data centres, once quietly built for decades near fibre networks and power sources such as Silicon Valley and the Washington DC area, expanded dramatically after the launch of ChatGPT sparked an AI arms race. Tech companies pushed for rapid construction of massive "hyperscale" facilities, a drive the Trump administration supported by rolling back environmental regulations, prompting firms to seek out the cheapest available land, power and water across the country.