Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) isn't mincing words. On Monday, he took to X to call the Republican-backed Ratepayer Protection Act 'fakery' as GOP lawmakers consider holding a Senate vote on the measure next week.

Murphy wrote that the bill, sponsored by Sen. Jon Husted (R-Ohio), 'does nothing' because it 'contains no new mandatory rules restricting data centers.'

'It's just fakery to try to fool voters into forgetting that Republicans spent the entire term trying to stop states from regulating AI (as requested by the AI companies),' he wrote.

GOP Pushes Senate Data Center Vote

The comments came after Burgess Everett reported that Republicans are pushing to keep the Senate in session next week for a roll-call vote on Husted's bill.

Husted has said, 'Voters overwhelmingly support the idea of data centers paying their own way,' and argued that the measure would show Republicans are responding to voter concerns.

Democrats have previously objected to the bill. Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) said it is voluntary and 'lacks teeth,' while Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called it a 'fraud.'

House Passed Data Center Bill

The House passed the bipartisan Ratepayer Protection Act 417-3 to prevent Americans from bearing electricity infrastructure costs tied to AI data centers.

The bill would establish a federal standard requiring states to consider rules ensuring large-load customers such as data centers cover the full, incremental costs of generation, transmission and distribution upgrades needed to serve them.

The bill would have required utilities to consider rates that recover grid upgrade costs from large-load customers, including data centers with peak demand of at least 100 megawatts.

AI Data Center Expansion

Last week, Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. (NYSE:BABA) unveiled its Zhenwu V900 AI chip and planned to expand Alibaba Cloud's global data center capacity to more than 20 gigawatts by 2032.

CEO Eddie Wu compared AI's growth with the early stages of electrification.

Earlier this month, Macro investor Raoul Pal had said data centers were being built at only about 30% of the pace needed for the AI race, arguing that U.S.-China competition and infrastructure bottlenecks would drive a major capital spending 'supercycle.'

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had dismissed concerns over data center water use, saying 'data centers don't use water.'

However, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimated U.S. data centers consumed about 66 billion liters of water in 2023, with hyperscale facilities projected to consume up to 124 billion liters annually by 2028.

Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by MarketDash editors.