Amid Data Center Attack Ads, Crowley Balances Union Support, Public Opinion

Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley speaks after becoming the Democratic nominee for governor. Photo by Jeramey Jannene.

A recent attack on Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley, the Democratic nominee for governor, accuses him of being in the pocket of “data center special interests.”

“Crowley’s campaign is funded by the people building them,” a voiceover for the ad, paid for by Republican nominee Tom Tiffany, intones.

That’s a reference to a handful of building trades unions — carpenters, operating engineers, steamfitters and others — who have endorsed Crowley, and written checks in support of his bid for Wisconsin’s highest office.

Data centers have emerged as a key issue in the general election between Tiffany and Crowley. Seeking to define themselves in the early days of the race, each accuses the other of selling out Wisconsin to an industry that is deeply unpopular with voters.

The issue leaves pro-union Democrats like Crowley navigating difficult terrain: weighing the environmental and infrastructural costs of these massive developments against the prospect of well-paying jobs for Wisconsin workers.

For Crowley’s campaign, union support is a centerpiece of his platform. The son of a union electrician, Crowley pointed to his endorsements from organized labor the day he reentered the race for governor.

At a recent event touting endorsements from pro-environmental groups, Crowley said local communities should have control over whether these projects are built nearby. He has called for a host of regulation to be enacted around those projects already underway or to be approved in the future, including requiring technology companies to cover infrastructure costs and use renewable energy.

And one of those requirements, he said, is that any data center should be built by union labor.

An internal divide among labor unions

Some of the unions backing Crowley are explicitly pro-data centers. The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, or IBEW, has described these developments as an historic avenue for high-paying skilled labor. They donated $86,000 to Crowley’s campaign.

So did the Wisconsin Pipe Trades Association. The International Union of Operating Engineers Local 139, Wisconsin Carpenters, and Steamfitters Local 601 also made five-figure donations to his campaign.

In a December 2025 op-ed published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Emily Pritzkow, the head of the Wisconsin Building Trades Council, wrote that data center construction creates opportunities for thousands of Wisconsinites.

“This is the work that builds the middle class,” she wrote.

That logic means building trades across the country are broadly supportive of these projects, according to Anne Lofaso, a labor law expert at the University of Cincinnati College of Law.

But many other labor unions are more skeptical, she added, “because they feel it’s going to ultimately take away jobs because (data centers are) creating AI, and AI will automatize many jobs.”

At the national level, she said, many prominent labor unions are internally navigating how to seize on the opportunity of data centers while pushing for safeguards against things like increased energy costs.

That includes the AFL-CIO, the country’s largest union umbrella organization, which recently passed a resolution calling for promises that the technology companies behind data centers must pay commensurate energy and water costs.

Working with sympathetic lawmakers can help unions accomplish those goals, said Lofaso.

“Legislation is the floor of rights in which unions can bargain,” she said. “So, the better the legislation is, in terms of workers’ rights, the more bargaining power the union has.”

Political parties navigating this divide

Good union jobs are a cornerstone of the “affordability agenda” that Crowley is running on. In a statement, a campaign spokesperson said unions support Crowley because “he will implement the incredibly strict guardrails needed to stop big tech from steamrolling workers and local communities.”

But for much of his Democratic base, the risks of data centers outweigh their benefits.

Nationally, Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, has called for a moratorium on data center construction. Wisconsin Rep. Francesca Hong, D-Madison, a leading contender for the Democratic nomination who lost to Crowley by fewer than 4,000 votes, called for the same — a position that drew interest on the campaign trail.

In an interview with WPR, Hong said her moratorium plan was aimed at slowing development so that regulations could be put in place. She also said her conversations with the building trades unions “have been that the moratorium would not interfere with existing construction right now.”

And opposition to data centers is bipartisan, nationally and in Wisconsin. “There was stunningly little difference for our normally extremely polarized state,” Marquette pollster Charles Franklin told the New York Times.

That’s led Tiffany to adopt a stance at odds with President Donald Trump, with whom he is closely aligned. Trump has championed data centers, recently saying that any community that rejects a data center is “making a mistake.”

“Because it means jobs, and it means tremendous tax revenue coming into the towns and cities that take them,” he said. “So, you know, it’s like the smart ones are saying, ‘I want them so badly.’”

Tiffany has called for an end to state subsidies for data centers. In a statement, his campaign pledged to bring good-paying jobs and opportunity to Wisconsin without sacrificing our farmland, driving up utility bills, subsidizing massive data centers, putting our water at risk, or ignoring the concerns of local communities.”

Tiffany is one of many Republican politicians who have begun to oppose these projects, according to a Washington Post analysis. Over the weekend, he sought to downplay that difference as he campaigned in western Wisconsin. Data center projects gobble up farmland, Tiffany said, and Trump also opposes farmland conversion.

But while some union members have shifted toward Republicans in recent years, their leadership and coveted endorsements still lean toward Democratic politicians.

That puts a union-backed candidate vying for the narrow margin of votes that swings a Wisconsin general election in a position of “threading that needle,” said Lofosa, the labor lawyer.

“He’s saying we want these jobs, but we’re going to have them safe,” she said.

Amid data center attacks, Crowley seeks to balance union support, public opinion was originally published by Wisconsin Public Radio.