This story appeared in Today, Explained, a daily newsletter that helps you understand the most compelling news and stories of the day. Subscribe here.

Do the words “data center” make you want to drop everything and call your congressional representative? You’re not alone, if we judge the nation’s mood by the actions of politicians who poll-test what they eat for breakfast (and there are worse ways). 

This looks like the week that the data center backlash broke containment and became the defining issue of this political moment. 

In the Texas governor’s race, Democrat Gina Hinojosa went up with an ad against Republican Gov. Greg Abbott over data centers with the punchline: “Greg Abbott is selling you out.” In a critical toss-up House race, Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) launched an attack against her Republican challenger over his support for data centers. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro, a likely contender for the 2028 Democratic presidential nomination who had previously touted data center investments, signed an executive order to limit their construction. He also bashed his opponent on data centers in a new campaign ad — a response to the Republican attacking him over those same facilities.

In my home state of Ohio, national Republicans are so worried about data centers damaging Sen. Jon Husted’s reelection chances that they sent a memo this week to top AI companies to warn that they could lose the seat because of the issue. And Mike Rogers, the Republican trying to win the Michigan Senate race for the GOP, went so far as to endorse a moratorium on data center building.

Go a little deeper

In one image, this is why politicians are screaming at anyone who will listen that they loathe these data centers just as much as you do and want to stop Big Tech from building any more. It is a stunning turnaround: The percentage of Americans who “strongly oppose” a data center being constructed in their area has more than doubled in a single year.

As Molly Taft documented in a recent feature story for Wired, the relationship between the ubiquitous data-center backlash and the fears about AI is becoming hard to ignore: Most people still say they oppose data centers even when they don’t live anywhere near one, and most people opposed to data centers are also more likely to be skeptical of AI. And those sentiments are clearly bipartisan, which is why you have a Democrat and a Republican in the Michigan Senate race striking the same tone on data centers.

The merits of both sides in the data-center debate are probably more nuanced than the political slogans popping up around it. But this phenomenon is clearly about something bigger than the brick-and-mortar buildings that have become these political boogeymen. As Marina Bolotnikova put it in a story for Vox earlier this summer: Americans don’t know how to fight AI. So they’re fighting data centers instead.

And now the politicians are following their lead.

One link for later

➨ Print your photos like it’s the 1990s. When everybody carries a camera in their pocket and snaps candids as casually as taking a sip of water, it’s easy to become jaded about all those pictures. Don’t be. The best way to appreciate them, Adam Clark-Estes argues in his latest piece on living in our tech-dominated world, is to print those images out like you did a few decades ago. Cherish your memories by holding them in your hands.

Before you go…

• Did you know…Cuba has more than twice as many doctors per capita as the United States? But that hasn’t stopped the island nation’s healthcare system from deteriorating to the point of crisis, as Ananya Rupanagunta writes for Vox.
• Today’s trivia: What’s the insect stage after larva? (You can find this and other brain puzzles in Vox’s daily crossword. Look for the answer in tomorrow’s edition.)
• Yesterday’s trivia: Yesterday we asked you for the name of the Survivor contestant who holds the franchise’s record for most appearances. That would be Cirie Fields, who appeared on six seasons between 2006 and 2026.

This story appeared in Today, Explained, a daily newsletter that helps you understand the most compelling news and stories of the day. Subscribe here.

America’s national debt cleared $40 trillion for the first time ever on Wednesday, a number so comically large as to feel imaginary. Seriously — look at it in all of its comma-strewn glory: $40,203,821,194,241. And because the US racks up tens of thousands of dollars of new debt every second, that number was outdated even as I typed it.

On some level, the steady ballooning of the national debt is basic math, familiar to anyone with a budget of their own. The government’s expenses — particularly the costs of Social Security and Medicare — are growing, while successive rounds of tax cuts have reduced the revenue available to cover them. As the government accumulates more debt, it also has to spend more just to cover the interest. 

But national debt also functions very differently from household debt, because a government is very different from an individual or family. For one thing, it doesn’t have a set lifespan or retirement age, which means it can roll its debt over indefinitely. For another, government borrowing can boost the economy’s productivity in the future, which changes some trade-offs. Rising national debt isn’t a big deal if the economy is growing alongside it.

That isn’t the case right now, though…and it hasn’t been for a couple of years. America’s debt is outpacing its economic growth, with increasingly tangible consequences for your personal finances.

How the national debt makes your life more expensive

The mechanisms here are a little wonky, but — in short — when the federal government borrows more money, it tends to push up borrowing costs for businesses and consumers. Government deficit spending can increase competition for loans — because the government is now borrowing more in addition to individuals and businesses — as well as prompt investors to demand higher rates on long-term loans and contribute to inflation, which can lead the Fed to nudge rates higher. 

As a result, mortgages, car loans, credit cards, and business loans all become more expensive. The Yale Budget Lab estimates that the increase in federal debt over the past decade has added roughly $2,500 a year to the cost of a mortgage on a typical home. 

That’s not a trivial amount of money. And over the life of a 30-year loan, it adds up to roughly $76,000, which — if HGTV does not deceive me — is enough for a down payment on a modest lakefront home.

Unfortunately, the solutions for slowing the growth of the national debt are not terribly popular. You could hike taxes, for instance. Or you could overhaul Social Security, which runs $1.38 trillion a year. But few politicians have historically had the stomach for the combination of spending cuts and tax increases that righting this ship requires.

One link for later

➨ Put a price tag on your memories. (Or maybe…don’t?) In the era of super-pricey concert tickets, some fans are shelling out tens of thousands of dollars to see live shows. Vox spoke to one man who’s spent $15,000 on Beyoncé tickets alone. “My mom’s big motto in life was, ‘We’re making memories,’” he said, by way of explanation. 

Before you go…

• Did you know…that, as late as 2007, American cellphone users still placed more calls each year than they sent text messages?
• Today’s trivia: Which competitor from the reality TV show Survivor holds the record for most appearances in the long-running franchise — though she’s never actually won? (You can find this and other brain puzzles in Vox’s daily crossword. Look for the answer in tomorrow’s edition.)
• Yesterday’s trivia: Yesterday we asked you for Jackie Robinson and Jackie Joyner-Kersee’s shared alma mater. Both trailblazing athletes attended UCLA, albeit 40 years apart.