Virginia governor launches AI task force and moves to curb data center expansion

Virginia pairs AI oversight with data center limits

Virginia Governor Abigail Spanberger has directed the state government to take steps that could give local communities a bigger voice in data center development and slow the pace of approvals in a state already home to the data center capital of the world, according to The Verge.

The move came through Executive Order 22, which combines restrictions on how data center projects proceed with the creation of a new artificial intelligence task force — an approach that treats AI policy and the infrastructure needed to run AI as two halves of the same problem.

What Executive Order 22 does

According to The Verge, the order bans officials in Virginia's executive branch from signing nondisclosure agreements for data center projects, a practice that has historically kept details of proposed facilities out of public view. It also requires the state to expedite noise regulations and mandates a review of the backup-generation operations that data centers rely on, a longstanding concern for neighbors of facilities running generators during outages or grid stress.

The same order establishes an AI task force with two core jobs: evaluating how Virginia's government can address risks to residents — including workforce displacement and data privacy — and determining how existing state law can be applied to harms caused by AI systems.

A separate accountability framework

Alongside the order, Spanberger released what her administration calls a Data Center Accountability Framework, which The Verge describes as a set of additional priorities. These include eliminating "by-right approval," a zoning pathway that for years let developers in Loudoun County build on certain land without additional approvals; removing some state subsidies for the industry; establishing environmental guardrails; and protecting residents from the increased energy prices associated with data center growth.

Environmental groups want more

The Verge reports that the press release announcing the actions included statements from environmental organizations praising the governor's approach, but not everyone is satisfied. The Piedmont Environmental Council, a nonprofit that has pushed for a moratorium on new development, argued the measures do too little for communities already living with existing facilities. PEC president Chris Miller said the framework "largely addresses standards on new data centers and does not deal with what's already built and in the pipeline," pointing to ongoing impacts accumulating in communities now.

Part of a wider state-level shift

The Virginia action fits a broader pattern The Verge identifies: states acting on data center and AI policy themselves while Congress and President Donald Trump have been slow or resistant to sweeping federal changes. On the same day, California Governor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order convening experts to tackle AI safety issues. Earlier, New York Governor Kathy Hochul and Texas Governor Greg Abbott both took executive action aimed at reining in rapid data center development.

Why it matters

Virginia is not a random backdrop for this policy. As The Verge notes, the state is home to the data center capital of the world, which means rules written in Richmond shape expansion plans for major cloud and AI operators far beyond the state's borders. A governor moving to restrain that growth — while simultaneously standing up an AI task force to weigh questions like job displacement and privacy — links two policy tracks that are usually discussed separately: what AI systems are allowed to do, and what their physical footprint costs the places that host them.

The order also illustrates how much of American AI governance is now being written at the state level. With federal legislation largely stalled, directives like Spanberger's become the operating rules for the industry, from disclosure norms in permitting to how noise, emissions and electricity costs are handled. For cloud providers, the message is that the era of relatively frictionless data center expansion in Virginia may be closing, even as the state positions itself to regulate the AI workloads those facilities serve.