Out Of 45 Data Center Votes Across America, Exactly One Went The Industry's Way

Harwood, North Dakota, a town of about 940 people ten miles from Fargo, was the only place in the country where voters sided with a data center on Election Day, according to Redbud Consulting data cited by Fortune, which counted 45 data center ballot measures nationwide. In Harwood, about 75 percent of the 430 votes cast, 325, went against Measure 2, a charter amendment that would have put new hurdles in front of large industrial projects. The results are unofficial.Harwood, North Dakota (via Nextdoor)The measure would have amended the town's Home Rule Charter to require independent reviews and public hearings for large industrial projects. A grassroots group, Voices of Harwood, finished drafting it in January and, in August, gathered 91 signatures in three days, more than twice the 40 required. Its organizer, software developer Michael Swartz, who has lived in town nearly 20 years, told Fortune the language that reached the ballot differed significantly from what his group had submitted.The target was Applied Digital's Polaris Forge 2, a $3 billion, 280-megawatt AI campus on the edge of town. Harwood's city council approved it in September 2025 over strong objections from residents, and construction began that month. Fortune reports residents had learned of it about three weeks earlier. Applied Digital announced in October 2025 a lease worth about $5 billion over 15 years for 200 megawatts with an unnamed hyperscaler, and by March it had closed $2.15 billion in financing for a campus local TV described as leased to Oracle.Construction is ongoing at Applied Digital's Polaris Forge 2 artificial intelligence data center Wednesday, June 24, 2026, south of Harwood.Chris Flynn / The ForumTown leaders and the regional business lobby fought the measure. Mayor Blake Hankey publicly opposed it and did not respond to Fortune's requests for comment. The Fargo Moorhead West Fargo Chamber of Commerce circulated materials claiming passage would cost taxpayers an extra $300,000 to $544,000 and raise annual taxes by thousands of dollars through lost projects. Hankey has said the data center will bring in $1.65 million in taxes by 2028, and Councilman Chris Higgins worried the measure could lead Applied Digital to de-annex the project and take the tax benefits with it.Swartz's side said the point was process, not the data center itself. "Long term, there's some really serious implications that I don't think have been fully fleshed-out," he told Fortune. His wife, Amanda Swartz, put it more simply: "People deserve a say in projects of this scope."The timing could hardly be worse for the industry elsewhere. As we reported, the Democratic sweep has put data center moratoriums at the center of the AI trade's worries, with the Nasdaq down more than 5 percent by midday Thursday in a selloff that hit hyperscaler and neocloud stocks. Separately, Microsoft was reported to be winding down its deal to rent Oracle's AI cloud capacity.North Dakota's own take on the vote surfaced within a day. On Nov. 4, the Plain Talk show posted a clip on X asking why the national anti-data center backlash fell flat in the state, with the account's guest and hosts discussing the Harwood vote.— Plain Talk (@PlainTalkND) November 4, 2026Applied Digital's Nick Phillips told Fortune the company chose Harwood for its cooler climate, access to energy and "pro-business landscape," and North Dakota exempts the project's computers, cooling systems and servers from its 5 percent sales tax.