Senate Clears 73-25 Hurdle for Data Center Power Bill

By Nathan Brooks

The U.S. Senate voted 73-25 on the evening of November 9, 2026, to begin debate on the Bipartisan American Affordability and Jobs Act, clearing the 60-vote cloture threshold with room to spare.

The vote was cloture on a motion to proceed, a routine step that opens debate and passes no measure. The bill still requires a final Senate vote, House approval and President Trump’s signature.

What does the bill change?

The package would speed federal permits for energy and infrastructure projects. It would also require AI companies and data center developers to pay for the power they use and the grid upgrades their projects require.

Senators Shelley Moore Capito, Mike Lee, Martin Heinrich and Sheldon Whitehouse wrote the legislation. Beyond data-center pricing, it rewrites federal environmental-review and transmission-approval rules.

The data-center provisions operate through utility pricing. According to an MLQ.ai bill summary, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would have 90 days after passage to require data centers to cover their share of the grid and the new costs they cause. Earlier summaries gave a different deadline, so the 90-day figure remains unsettled.

New data centers could not pass those added costs to other customers. They would continue paying if they left early and would post financial guarantees before utilities built capacity for them.

FERC could issue backstop permits for transmission lines of 230 kV or more after one year of state inaction. The bill would also shrink the period for suing under the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, from six years to 150 days.

Who pays for the grid?

The measure pulls utilities in two directions. Protecting households from data-center costs would reduce political risk around rate cases, but higher developer bills could slow the load growth behind the sector’s rally.

Regulated utilities earn a set return on what they build. Faster transmission permits can expand rate base, the investment base on which regulators allow them to earn that return.

The financial guarantees would reduce the risk of building for demand that never arrives. The Edison Electric Institute, which represents investor-owned utilities, supports the bill.

Brattle Group estimates that data centers would pay about $35 billion more over a decade than under current law. Rhodium Group projects household bills would be $50 to $78 lower per year in 2040.

Those estimates frame the commercial risk. Higher data-center costs could slow some projects, while the largest cloud companies already spend heavily on AI buildouts. Power, cooling and networking suppliers form the infrastructure chain behind those sites. A linked free report profiles seven AI infrastructure stocks outside the chip sector, covering that supplier chain.

How much political risk remains?

President Trump called the bill a “BIG WIN” in a Sunday post. On Monday, he said he would not approve wind turbines and that the bill lacked full agreement.

Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto said she would vote against final passage if Title III remains in the legislation. House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, expected to become speaker in January, said the bill falls short.

The market barely responded, which makes sense for a bill that has cleared one routine vote. The State Street Utilities Select Sector SPDR ETF, or XLU, closed at $43.79 on November 9, up 1.53%.

XLU gained 5.75% over the past month and 4.71% year to date. No source tied that November 9 move to the vote.

XLU remains a broad instrument because it also holds gas, water and merchant power companies such as Atmos Energy and American Water Works. The First Trust NASDAQ Clean Edge Smart Grid Infrastructure Index Fund, or GRID, offers more direct exposure to transmission spending; it rose $6.72 to $160.93 on November 9.

What happens next?

Up to 30 more hours of debate remain, and more Senate votes are expected later in the week of November 9. The positive investment view fails if the Senate rejects the bill or removes the FERC pricing provision.

If the package survives, faster permits and clearer cost recovery should favor regulated transmission investment. Higher data-center bills could then slow AI capacity growth.