CoreWeave Writes to Hinojosa: an AI Data-Center Giant Asks Texas's Governor-Elect to Work With It Before the Moratorium Fight Arrives
"You have made clear that data center growth must work for Texas. We strongly support those principles." CoreWeave's CEO has written to Gina Hinojosa seeking cooperation on existing and future projects — the industry's opening move toward an administration elected on a pledge to pause new development.
AUSTIN — The data-center industry has made its first named move toward the incoming administration. CoreWeave, one of the largest builders of artificial-intelligence computing infrastructure, has written to Texas Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa seeking cooperation on its existing and future data-center projects in the state, according to a Bloomberg News report by Aidan Williams republished November 10 and read in full by this desk. In a statement, CoreWeave co-founder and chief executive Michael Intrator said the company supported Hinojosa's position that data-center development should benefit Texas residents. "You have made clear that data center growth must work for Texas," Intrator said. "We strongly support those principles." He added: "We welcome the opportunity to work with your transition team on the responsible completion of permitted projects and on clear, durable standards for future development."
The letter lands on a specific pledge. During her campaign, Hinojosa promised to pursue a statewide moratorium on new data-center development while establishing stronger safeguards for communities and for the state's electricity and water resources. She has also said she wants to balance Texas's business-friendly reputation with policies that ensure residents benefit from new investment: "We have always been a pro-business state in Texas, but what changes now with me as governor is it has to be a partnership that benefits Texans," she told CNN. The report is careful about the distance between pledge and policy: the election has put the future of data-center construction in Texas under greater scrutiny, but Hinojosa's proposed moratorium has not yet become state policy.
The politics behind the outreach are the ones this station's readers have been living. Candidates who campaigned for greater oversight of data-center construction benefited from growing public concern about electricity consumption, water use, infrastructure costs and the facilities' impact on local communities — concerns centered, in this station's coverage area, on Dallas-Fort Worth, which holds the state's largest concentration of data centers with the fastest expansion in Ellis County. Hinojosa, who defeated incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott, is the first Democrat elected governor of Texas since Ann Richards won the office in 1990. What her transition team answers to letters like CoreWeave's will be the first practical test of where the moratorium pledge meets the building boom.
