Moore and Cox differ on data centers at Maryland conference

by Christine Condon, Maryland Matters
August 15, 2026

As two-time Republican nominee for Maryland governor Dan Cox (R) puts it, hyperscale data centers are a “big difference between Wes Moore and me.”

One among many.

Cox has called for a statewide moratorium banning hyperscalers, and has targeted Moore on one project in particular: a project proposed in Charles County by TeraWulf, which recently received federal approval to purchase a retired coal plant that it plans to use for the project.

During his remarks Saturday at a statewide candidates’ forum at the Maryland Association of Counties summer conference in Ocean City, Cox highlighted a pair of $6,000 donations that Moore received in 2025 from TeraWulf’s founder and his wife, according to state campaign finance records.

“The governor has a scandal, folks. He accepted a $12,000 donation to his campaign from the owner of TeraWulf, and then gave a power plant, the Morgantown power plant in Charles County, to that data center hyperscale developer,” Cox said.

TeraWulf reached a deal with plant owner GenOn Holdings, and that deal was approved by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. But Moore’s administration has signaled it would support routing natural gas to the site and remediating if of pollution. In a letter from the Maryland Department of the Environment, it pledged to assist the data center developer with running natural gas pipelines to the power plant site, first reported by the Baltimore Banner.

“Folks, we need a [data center] moratorium. I will institute it immediately so that we can study this,” Cox said. “It’s also outdated technology. We all know that Elon Musk is building these in stars. We also know that China is putting them at the bottom of the ocean.”

Moore was the first to the podium during Saturday’s event, which featured a round-robin of candidates for governor, comptroller and attorney general. Because candidates appeared separately, Moore did not have an opportunity to respond to Cox’s remarks at the podium.

The governor’s staff did not immediately respond to a request for comment Saturday afternoon. But the governor spoke about the importance of careful data center regulation in Maryland.

“Virginia has the largest concentration of data centers — not in the United States, in the world — and the way they did it there cannot and will not happen in the state of Maryland,” Moore said.

A recent poll found the governor with a comfortable 27-point lead over Cox, slightly smaller than his 32-point margin of victory over Cox, who was also the GOP nominee four years ago.

Moore also repeated what is becoming a common refrain of his: That any data centers in Maryland ought to bring their own energy, pay for their own infrastructure improvements, hire local union labor and meet environmental regulations. But Moore maintained that local officials should have the power to say no. Many major jurisdictions, both red and blue, have instituted temporary moratoriums of late.

“If there is a local jurisdiction that does not want it, guess what? It will not go there, because local jurisdictions need to have a final say,” Moore said amid applause from the audience at the conference, which is geared toward county government officials in the state.

The forum also featured other candidates for statewide office. Comptroller Brooke Lierman (D) faced off against her opponent Sonya Dunn (R), a businesswoman and political newcomer who faces an uphill battle in deep blue Maryland. So, too, does attorney James B. Rutledge III (R), Attorney General Anthony Brown’s opponent in November. Brown, however, did not appear at Saturday’s forum.

Unsurprisingly, Cox came out swinging  at Saturday’s panel, which was moderated by Maryland Matters reporter Bryan P. Sears and Mileah Kromer, the director of the University of Maryland Baltimore County Institute of Politics. Cox opened his remarks by criticizing the sitting governor over residents who are choosing to leave the state for other states, arguing that two of his eldest children have also left the state due to affordability issues.

An October report from the comptroller’s office found that the state is losing an average of 40,000 people each year to states with lower housing costs.

“These are Marylanders. They’re citizens, and they said that they’re not going to be serfs of Wes Moore’s Annapolis,” Cox said Saturday.

When data centers come knocking, counties should have a ‘wish list,’ officials say

Moore, for his part, argued that the federal government under President Donald Trump (R) has played a major role in undermining the state economy, by firing government employees who live in Maryland, restricting or rescinding federal aid dollars and more.

“The budget gap exists for for two reasons,” Moore said. “It exists because for too long we have relied too much on the federal government, and it exists because we were spending more than we were growing.”

Moore touted that his administration has presented a balanced budget, as required, during each of his four years in office, and he pledged to diversify the state’s economy and control spending if reelected. Moore also touted improvements in Maryland since he took office, including a dramatic decline in homicides in Baltimore and reductions in vacant housing units in Maryland’s largest city.

“I came here four years ago — that was actually the first time that for many of you I got a chance to meet you. I did not come from the world of politics. I was coming to say that we were going to change that relationship between our state and our locals. That we’re going to strengthen it. We were  going to move in partnership,” Moore said. “Four years later, I can say that we’ve kept our word.”

Maryland Matters is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Maryland Matters maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Steve Crane for questions: info@marylandmatters.org.