As artificial intelligence infrastructure explodes across America, building trades unions have become powerful allies of the world's richest technology companies, securing unprecedented construction work while simultaneously silencing community opposition to massive data center projects that raise urgent questions about energy, water, and environmental sustainability.
The partnership represents a fundamental shift in labor politics: unions are now echoing tech industry arguments about national security competition with China and actively countering grassroots opposition to developments that communities fear will strain local resources. This alliance has forced Democrats to navigate a painful choice between supporting workers seeking jobs and backing progressives demanding stronger environmental and community protections.
A Historic Employment Surge Built on Data Centers
The scale of union growth tied to data center construction is extraordinary. North America's Building Trades Unions hit a record number of members and apprentices in 2025, with union leaders attributing the expansion directly to data center projects. In Columbus, Ohio, data centers account for at least 40% of work hours performed by members of the Building and Construction Trades Council. In metropolitan Washington, D.C., the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 26 reports that data centers represent at least 50% of member work hours.
The Boilermakers Local 154 in southwestern Pennsylvania exemplifies the transformation. After watching power plants shut down and recruiting zero apprentices for four years, the union assembled an apprentice class of over 200 to support data center construction and the power infrastructure required to run them. Union official Shawn Steffee acknowledged that more workers are needed.
Rob Bair, president of the Pennsylvania Building and Construction Trades Council, framed the union position bluntly: "When people say, you know, 'data centers are the root of all evil,' we're just saying, 'look, they do create a hell of a lot of construction jobs, which we live and work in your communities.'" He suggested communities negotiate directly with tech companies for concessions, including school funding and project improvements. "If you don't ask, you're never gonna get," Bair said.
The Political Cost of Labor's Alliance
Unions have become visible forces in municipal and state legislatures, actively opposing regulations and environmental protections that might slow data center development. Pennsylvania state Sen. Katie Muth, a Democrat, described the difficulty of building support for data center regulation legislation when competing against union-backed alternatives she views as weaker. "The unions don't want to promote anything that would impede data center development," Muth said.
Union representatives have made their presence felt at packed municipal meetings from St. Louis to Spring City, Pennsylvania. At a Joliet, Illinois City Council meeting, community member Alicia Morales complained that union members—seated in the front row holding "vote yes for union jobs" signs—had been disrespectful and "bullied a lot of people" entering the meeting.
In statehouses, unions have worked against Maine's since-vetoed proposal for a statewide data center moratorium, standards proposed in Illinois including requirements that data centers supply their own energy, and efforts to end Virginia's sales tax exemption that made it the world's biggest data center destination.
Tech Companies Embrace Union Partnership
Tech giants have actively cultivated these relationships. Sam Altman, co-founder and CEO of OpenAI, said in a joint statement in March with union leadership, "Across the country, highly skilled union construction workers are laying the foundation for the AI economy." Google announced a $10 million grant to a union-backed electricians training program, saying it would expand the electrician workforce pipeline by 70%.
Mark McManus, general president of the United Association of Union Plumbers and Pipefitters, acknowledged the optics of organized labor partnering with "the richest, most powerful companies in the world," but rejected criticism as impractical. "If we chose as a union to have a moratorium on building the data centers because we didn't believe it was right for America, the data centers would still be getting built," McManus said. He noted his union has negotiated labor agreements on major projects, including an Oracle and OpenAI Stargate campus in Michigan and "Project Blue" in Arizona, and reported that based on an internal survey, union members work on over 90% of data center projects in the United States.
National unions have also negotiated labor agreements on major projects, with more in development. When Gov. Josh Shapiro announced that Amazon would spend $20 billion on two data center projects in eastern Pennsylvania, Bair stood alongside Amazon executives. Shapiro said, "This is really unique, what we're building here in this commonwealth. People coming together with common purpose to get stuff done."
An Associated General Contractors of America survey suggested that data center construction labor composition likely mirrors commercial construction overall, which is roughly one-third union.
Why This Matters:
The union-tech alliance illustrates a critical tension in progressive politics: the immediate material needs of working people versus long-term community and environmental sustainability. While data center construction jobs provide genuine economic opportunity for skilled workers and their families, the partnership has effectively neutralized organized labor as a counterweight to corporate power in debates about energy consumption, water depletion, and community impact. When unions—historically advocates for public interest protections—become primary defenders of corporate development projects, democratic accountability weakens. Communities raising concerns about resource sustainability now face not only corporate opposition but also organized labor opposition, making it harder for elected officials to enact protective regulations. The question of whether short-term construction employment justifies long-term infrastructure strain remains largely unexamined in public discourse, even as unions and tech companies frame data center expansion as inevitable and necessary.