Developer Sues Small Town That Banned a Data Center

A small Kentucky town voted to protect itself from a data center — and now the developer has filed a lawsuit to override that vote. Plus: House Republicans claim China is bankrolling the resistance, a Senate fact-check on electricity bills lands, and a $40 billion data center megadeal closes.

🏘️ **COMMUNITY** — In Cave City, Kentucky (pop. 1,200), the city council passed a 12-month moratorium on data centers after a developer filed plans to build a 380-acre facility on Doyle Avenue. Kentucky Industrial Alliance immediately sued in Barren Circuit Court, arguing the moratorium was passed in violation of state law after the company already invested millions. On June 12, local utility cooperatives Farmers RECC and EKPC released a statement on the contested proposal.

⚖️ **LEGAL** — House Republicans launched a formal congressional investigation alleging that foreign-linked groups tied to China are funding and amplifying grassroots opposition to U.S. data centers. Ways and Means Chair Jason Smith wants Treasury to strip these groups' tax-exempt status. Republicans gave FBI Director Kash Patel a June 18 deadline to brief Congress. OpenAI echoed the claims; no direct coordination has been proven.

⚡ **POWER** — PolitiFact fact-checked Sen. Elizabeth Warren's claim that people near data centers pay 267% more for electricity. The verdict: the figure is real but refers to wholesale market prices, not residential bills. Actual national residential electricity prices are up 33% since 2019 — and utilities filed $9.4 billion in rate-hike requests in Q1 2026 alone.

🏗️ **NEW BUILD** — Vantage Data Centers' "Lighthouse" campus in Port Washington, Wisconsin — a $15 billion, 672-acre OpenAI and Oracle Stargate site — is actively under construction. TMJ4 got an exclusive look inside this week. But the mayor who approved the deal, Ted Neitzke, now faces a recall campaign from residents who say they had no real voice.

💰 **INVESTMENT** — BlackRock's Global Infrastructure Partners, Abu Dhabi's MGX, and the AI Infrastructure Partnership (Microsoft, Nvidia) closed the largest data center acquisition in history: $40 billion for Aligned Data Centers — nearly 2.5× the prior record. U.S. data center investment reached $44.7 billion in Q1 2026 alone, up 28% year over year.

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