As the midterm campaign season kicks off in earnest, President Trump’s claims of economic relief are colliding with a painful reality for voters: energy costs are surging.
Electricity bills have climbed at more than double the rate of inflation over the past year, squeezing household budgets nationwide. And this week, a year’s worth of savings at the gas pump vanished in a single day as conflict in the Middle East sent prices spiking.
Trump sought to reassure anxious consumers on Tuesday. “As soon as this ends, those prices are going to drop, I believe, lower than even before,” Trump told reporters, referencing the ongoing war in Iran. He vowed to offer military escorts and risk insurance to oil tankers traveling through the Strait of Hormuz, a critical waterway in the Middle East through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s oil supply passes, and which Iran has shut to through traffic.
While the gas price spike may prove temporary, the administration faces a more persistent energy problem: soaring electricity bills driven by technology companies’ voracious demands for power. That prompted the White House to convene the chief executives of America’s largest technology companies on Wednesday afternoon to address the issue.
Google, Amazon, OpenAI, Microsoft, xAI, Oracle and Meta are expected to sign a pledge to offset the electricity needed to power artificial intelligence data centers, according to a White House official. The companies will commit to “build, bring, or buy their own power supply” for new AI facilities, said White House spokesperson Taylor Rogers.
The White House official added that companies are also agreeing to “cover the cost of all power delivery infrastructure upgrades,” adding that the firms were vowing to “lower electricity costs in the long run.”
Trump unveiled the tech pledge during his State of the Union address last week — one of few affordability measures in a speech that came as voters continue to rank cost of living as their top concern.
The rise of data centers — used to power everything from cloud storage to popular AI platforms — has strained the nation’s aging electrical grid, pushing consumer electricity prices higher and putting the companies in the crosshairs of suburban voters. The average cost of electricity rose 6.3 percent in 2025 — more than twice the 2.4 percent inflation rate during that period, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“Somebody thought this through, that he wants to get ahead of the story,” said Mark Wolfe, who leads the National Energy Assistance Directors Association. “One of the stories is rising electric prices.”
Between 2015 and 2021, electricity bills mostly tracked with the rate of inflation, giving Americans a sense of predictability, according to Wolfe, whose organization supports state low-income home energy assistance programs.
“What’s different now is that lower middle class and middle class people are saying this is getting unaffordable: ‘In order to pay this bill, I can’t pay for something else,’” Wolfe added.
But even as the White House trumpets the pledge from major tech behemoths, doubts abound over whether those companies will follow through on their commitments. The White House pledge is voluntary and not enforceable. Even if firms invest in their own power generation — as Amazon and Microsoft have already begun doing with nuclear and renewable projects — those efforts could take years to materialize and may still require support from existing power grids.
“These companies have the incentive to move ahead of the demand because they realize that if they can build really rapidly and have the infrastructure in place for the future; they’re able to get a bigger market share and be really competitive with the service they’re offering,” said Rachel Mural, a senior research associate at the Harvard Kennedy School Belfer Center.
Trump is not alone in trying to address voter anger over data center electricity demands. Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro unveiled a similar proposal in his budget address weeks prior to Trump’s announcement. And in Georgia, New York and Oklahoma, state lawmakers have introduced legislation to impose moratoriums on new data centers. In January, Trump hailed Microsoft for a commitment to pay higher utility rates to cover the company’s electricity costs. In Wisconsin, Microsoft CEO Brad Smith said those rates would be achieved in part by partnering with local utilities to help build out infrastructure. Trump said his team was “working with” Microsoft to secure the commitment. Wolfe suggested that companies paying discounted utility rates could offer rebates to residential customers who have absorbed higher costs, though no firm has made such a proposal. He noted that major corporate utility rates are typically closely guarded. Data centers have proliferated across the country, with significant concentrations in California, Virginia and Texas. The facilities have also appeared in the swing states of Georgia and Arizona, according to a Pew Research Center analysis. The issue has taken on partisan dimensions. A Politico/Public First survey conducted in January found that 37% of Americans said they trusted Democrats more to protect them from various forms of rising energy costs, compared to only 25% who said the same of Republicans. The dynamic marks a shift from the 2024 election, when Trump consistently polled as a more trusted steward of the economy. In December, three Democratic senators opened a probe into Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Meta, CoreWeave, Digital Realty, and Equinix to investigate the extent to which they are contributing to elevated electricity prices for consumers. “We need more transparency from these Big Tech companies,” said Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., one of the leaders of the investigation. “We can’t just take Big Tech’s vague promises that they’re not driving up your electricity bills. We need to see the receipts.” At Wednesday’s White House event, Trump will face the convergence of both energy challenges, with reporters likely to press him on rising costs for both oil and electricity as the midterm campaign accelerates.
Akayla Gardner is a White House correspondent for MS NOW. Recommended
