Data Centers Are Devouring Public Land

The AI Infrastructure Land Grab is no longer theoretical. It is happening in real communities as data centers devour public land, municipal golf courses, and green space across the country.

WATCH THE CLIP BELOW:

This clip aired on WarRoom’s morning show on December 12, 2025. Transcript begins below (lightly edited for clarity; may contain minor errors).

STEVE BANNON (HOST): What’s that headline right there, brother in the weekend Financial Times?

JOSH PETIT (GUEST): EU freezes €210 billion of Russian assets.

STEVE BANNON (HOST): Folks, when Viktor Orbán says you’re crossing the Rubicon, and he’s put it all on the line to work for peace over there and fought these demons in the EU, when he tells you cross the Rubicon, folks, when you talk about the kinetic part of the Third World War metastasizes and is not put to bed like President Trump’s trying to do, you’re going to remember some dates. And this date is going to be one of them.

So Josh Petit, I would normally have you on here. Remember, Josh is the Gulf Corps, the Alastair McKinsey Institute expert in golf course architecture. So I was thinking to have you on here, as we could fit it in before Christmas. President Trump is making a big effort on the D.C. courses. In fact, they’re taking now, Burgum came with the idea. When they’re taking the excavating for the big beautiful ballroom, he’s going to now use that as a berm to make even the links, little links courses on the water for the people, these little public courses.

I was going to have you for that or some other stuff, but I remembered when we were talking about the fires in California, the most succinct explanation of what went on was you. You said, hey look, don’t believe the stuff on the surface. This is an interlocking network of these coastal elites and what they’ve done. They’ve brought this on themselves. They’ve been working it for 30 years. And until you break that, all these commissions and NGOs and how they work together, just electing politicians, you’re just kidding yourself.

You’ve come up with something, and this is about the economy and where it’s going. When you talk about data centers and you talk about AI. And right now we had Doc Pete Chambers, running for governor of Texas, has said, yo, out here it’s going to be water. You’re sucking out the aquifers. You’re doing it in Arizona. I know in Arizona it’s a huge, huge issue.

You’ve sent me an article, sir, and if we can get it up, about a public golf course, I believe it’s in California. Walk me through it. Because the price tag, I think the course is worth, people play there and they play for almost no money. It’s these kind of blue collar folks, available to young people and to retirees, to play a beautiful course. I think the value of it is $5 million and it’s sold for, I think, $40 or $50 million. And the reason is it’s going to be a data center. Is that what’s happening? Is there some insidious effort by the tech bros, and now start, if they can’t get zoning in other places, they’re just going to go and roll up these golf courses, sir?

JOSH PETIT (GUEST): Well, Steve, you know, I can’t help but think of the irony here. Here in California, golf courses have been targeted for years, decades, by these overzealous NGOs who profiteer over the conversion of these golf courses into open space, which then allows them to source these state and federal grant monies that are funded by taxpayer dollars in order to conduct these big boondoggle restoration projects to fight climate change.

It’s part of the climate agenda, and it’s massive business for these people, to the tune of hundreds of millions and billions of dollars a year.

So myself and others have been fighting for a long time to protect some of these public municipal golf courses that are owned and operated by the cities and these counties. They provide very affordable public access golf at a very low cost.

So I was shocked last night to come across this article on Golf.com about this golf course. Actually, the story mainly focuses on a golf course in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, called Dolphin Highlands. And yes, it’s public. It’s owned by the county. It’s a municipal golf course. It’s very affordable. It’s actually thriving. It’s very busy. It does 50,000 rounds a year, which for a seven month season on the East Coast is a lot of golf. So it’s doing well.

And it was targeted by these AI, in this case an AI data center developer based out of Dallas, ten X the market value of this land. So for people that understand land use and zoning, you know the value, the market value of land, is really predicated on the land use and the allowable uses of the land.

So in the case of a piece of land for a golf course that’s on the commercial recreation, the valuation is only as much as the golf operation provides. But in this case, the county has rezoned the land to offer it up for industrial use, in this case data centers, which is why now they have tenants valuable and they sold $46 million.

The article goes on to talk about several other golf courses. There’s about half a dozen or so that are being targeted now, including one out here in California, not too far from me. That was a nine hole course designed by Alastair McKenzie, my hero.

You know, the data centers are going to provide noise pollution. It’s going to be a loss of this green space, a loss of recreational amenity. They require an enormous amount of water. And the key is they require an enormous amount of energy. That’s going to, in turn, significantly increase the electricity costs of the residents of this community.

And if you read the article, it says specifically that the sale of this land is predicated on some further due diligence to be able to prove that they have enough access to enough energy to be able to build this facility.

If all things fall into place, the golf course is set to close at the end of 2027, and then it’ll be developed into these data centers. But there’s another golf course also.

But I think this is just the beginning. And the irony here, going back to these environmental NGOs, is that the data centers are the antithesis of what these people fight for. You know, the data centers are going to provide noise pollution. It’s going to be a loss of this green space.

There’s another golf course also, just in this article, that’s targeted, called Hunting Hawk, in your beloved Richmond, Virginia, Hanover County. So that’s just one of these half dozen.

STEVE BANNON (HOST): But what you’re going to see is they’re going to go across. The data centers are devouring land. We’ve got all kind of analysis we’re going to show next week in the Phoenix area, but just absolutely devouring land.

STEVE BANNON (HOST): Josh, you’re breaking a massive story in the nation: Data centers are devouring golf courses and a lot more than golf courses.

JOSH PETIT (GUEST): And Steve, really quickly, in the article, the buried lead is a quote from Sam Altman. He says, "I guess that a lot of the world gets covered in data centers over time.” I encourage you to check out that article. I’m at AlisterMackenzie.org.