Ken Paxton is running for US Senate, and he has a plan. On August 24, Texas’s attorney general unveiled a four-point federal legislative platform centered on data centers and artificial intelligence infrastructure, proposing a ban on Chinese-linked technology in US data centers and criminal penalties for operators whose facilities power AI chatbots that harm children.
What Paxton is actually proposing
The platform has two federal pillars. The first would prohibit Chinese-linked technology from operating inside US data centers and critical infrastructure, a proposal that aligns with Paxton’s stated support for Senator Tom Cotton’s DATA Act, introduced January 7, 2026.
The second pillar is more novel: making data center operators criminally liable if their facilities are used to run AI chatbots that endanger children. That is a significant shift from the current framework, where platform liability sits primarily with software companies rather than the physical infrastructure underneath them.
On the state level, Paxton wants to repeal Texas’s sales tax exemptions for data centers. Currently, companies must invest at least $200 million and create at least 20 jobs to qualify for those exemptions. He also backs Governor Greg Abbott’s recent push for audits and greater transparency around data center projects, directives Abbott initiated in August 2026 in response to mounting community pressure over the industry’s footprint.
Why Texas is the right place to pick this fight
The Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages the state’s power grid, is currently processing interconnection requests for new large loads totaling between 438,000 and 474,000 megawatts. Roughly 90% of those requests come from data centers.
Local communities across rural Texas are raising objections over rising electricity bills, industrial water consumption, and the disconnect between the economic promises attached to data center approvals and the community benefits that actually materialize. Abbott’s audit directive is a direct response to that political pressure.
What this means for the industry
For data center operators, the most immediately consequential proposal is the Chinese technology prohibition. Large facilities routinely source networking equipment, servers, and cooling components from a global supply chain that includes manufacturers with Chinese state ties. Auditing and replacing that hardware across existing infrastructure would be expensive and logistically complex.
The criminal liability proposal for AI chatbots is less operationally specific right now, but the direction of travel is notable. If federal law eventually attaches liability to infrastructure rather than software, it would fundamentally change how data center operators assess the risk of their tenants’ workloads. A hyperscale facility leasing capacity to an AI startup would need to evaluate that startup’s product in ways that have no current precedent in the industry.
Paxton’s proposals are campaign platform material at this stage, not enacted law. The DATA Act’s existence suggests these ideas are already finding sponsors in Washington around tighter controls on Chinese technology in critical infrastructure and liability frameworks governing AI systems.