WASHINGTON ― Senate Republicans hope a symbolic vote this week on a symbolic bill about data centers can help them salvage their majority as Democrats surge in polling ahead of November’s midterm elections.

This week the Senate will hold a procedural vote on the Ratepayer Protection Act, a bill sponsored by Sen. John Husted (R-Ohio) that would tell state utility regulators to consider making data center developers pay any costs that states incur serving data centers, but would not require states, utilities or data center developers to take any concrete actions.

The key word in the legislation is “consider.” The bill merely tells state utility regulators they have an obligation to think about maybe shielding ratepayers from higher costs associated with connecting data centers. But the bill would allow Republicans ― especially Husted, who is trailing his Democratic opponent Sherrod Brown in polls ― to say they are at least trying to do something.

“This would require data centers to pay for their own electricity rather than pass it on to consumers,” Husted told reporters on Thursday, overstating the bill’s impact. “That’s something the American public wants. That’s something that everybody in Congress says they’re for. They say they’re for more affordability. This is a chance for everybody to prove it, and I hope we get it passed.”

Holding a vote on the legislation, along with considering a bill to regulate college sports, is the only reason the Senate remains in session ahead of the midterms. Depending on how eager members are to leave D.C. and hit the campaign trail, it’s possible the Senate will only hold procedural votes on the data center law rather than fully pass it.

Brown has hammered Husted, a former lieutenant governor of Ohio, as being “the face of data centers” in the state as voters increasingly blame the projects for spiking electric bills. Brown is trying to return to his old job just two years after being ousted in 2024, and has a small but consistent lead in public polling.

“The data centers, complements mostly of John Husted, were given two and a half billion dollars in tax subsidies to come to Ohio,” Brown said in a Facebook video uploaded Sunday. “They gobble up the land, they swallow up the water. Who knows what kind of noise pollution and air pollution they emit. Then after they’re built, then we all get the honor of paying higher electric bills.”

The House passed the Ratepayer Protection Act by an overwhelming bipartisan vote of 417 to 3 earlier this month, but it stalled in the Senate when Democrats objected to it passing by unanimous consent.

“It’s not enough for us to just tell states to consider making data centers pay for grid upgrades. Rather than voluntary pledges or suggestions to states, Congress needs to pass real legislation with real teeth,” Sen. Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) said on the Senate floor when he blocked the bill, calling on the Senate to instead pass a bill with mandatory provisions.

Though the Ratepayer Protection Act wouldn’t do much, blocking it is still awkward for Senate Democrats, especially since the legislation won overwhelming approval from their House colleagues.

“The only conclusion one can draw is that the Democrats have concluded that it is good politics for them not to allow the Republicans to ‘get a victory’ or the president to ‘get a victory’ in the middle of a political season,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said last week.

With quick passage blocked, Thune is now moving the bill through regular order, meaning it will require a series of procedural votes over a period of several days, with the first vote on Wednesday. Since the Senate’s leaving town this week until after the elections, it’s not likely the Ratepayer Protection Act will pass before then.

Still, some Republican senators have seemed desperate for their leadership to hold votes on policies addressing voter concerns about affordability. For the past week the chamber has been bogged down on a bill dealing with college sports.

“We haven’t done a damn thing, and it’s biting us in the ass right now,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) told reporters last week.

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