J. Stuart Adams, president of the Utah State Senate, was defeated in his GOP primary on Tuesday night. Adams, one of the longest-serving and most powerful politicians in Utah, lost largely due to his role in the controversial Box Elder County data center project beside the Great Salt Lake. Adams conceded defeat to Stephanie Hollist. The shocking result in Utah is among the most telling signs of voter backlash to data centers. NYT: Utah Senate President J. Stuart Adams Loses Primary After Data Center Backlash The president of the Utah State Senate who championed a huge data center beside the Great Salt Lake was defeated in his Republican primary on Tuesday night, one of the most high-profile signs of… — Politics & Poll Tracker (@PollTracker2024) June 24, 2026 More from The New York Times: Mr. Adams lost his Senate seat to Stephanie Hollist, a former university lawyer, who accused Mr. Adams and Utah’s political establishment of lacking transparency and ignoring their own voters by approving a data center project backed by the celebrity investor and “Shark Tank” personality Kevin O’Leary. Mr. Adams did not directly represent the 40,000-acre proposed site of the data center in Box Elder County, a fast-growing farming and industrial area about 60 miles north of Salt Lake City. But he became the focus of an anti-data-center groundswell because he served as chairman of a Utah agency that approved initial plans this spring to build the data center, known as Stratos. Thousands of Utah voters, many of them lifelong Republicans and members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, objected, venting their frustration in public comments and heated public meetings. They worried about how much energy it would consume and how its water usage would affect the drought-stricken Great Salt Lake, and accused state officials of granting the project generous tax breaks while ignoring the public’s concerns. On Wednesday afternoon, one Republican commissioner in Box Elder County who voted to move ahead with the data center conceded the race in his own primary election, and another was behind in his race, though the results had not been called. Adams trailed Hollist 43 percent to 35 percent in the early results, with a third candidate tallying 22 percent. However, Adams would eventually concede defeat. “I congratulate my opponent on their victory and wish them every success as they continue the important work of serving the people of Utah,” Adams said in a statement, according to The Salt Lake Tribune. “My hope is that our great state will continue to lead the nation and remain the number one state in America, a place where families thrive, businesses prosper and opportunity abounds for future generations,” he added. Utah Senate President Stuart Adams defeated in a primary, largely over data center issue https://t.co/864o9jFPB8 — Daniel Horowitz (@RMConservative) June 24, 2026 The Salt Lake Tribune shared further: The race was blown open last month after Adams, as chair of the powerful Military Industrial Development Authority, played a key role in approving a hyperscale data center project in Box Elder County. The move drew a firestorm of backlash over the proposed power and water consumption and a rushed process that opponents said shut down public input. Adams later demanded Kevin O’Leary, the celebrity investor behind the data center, shrink the physical size of the data center campus, commit to diverting water to the Great Salt Lake and provide additional transparency. The Adams campaign used it as proof of the senator’s political power. Voters in the district were bombarded with direct mail pieces and AI-generated videos. In one AI ad from the Adams campaign, the senator is shown wrestling a lion. In another, the campaign accuses Hollist of taking money from George Soros, a billionaire backer of liberal causes, and thinking voters are too stupid to notice. Hollist spent more than $181,000, as of the pre-primary campaign disclosures, compared to nearly $429,000 by Adams. Hess spent less than $6,000. The post Data Center Backlash Spurs Primary Defeat Of Prominent Republican State Lawmaker appeared first on 100PercentFedUp.com.