“No data centers in the desert,” said Democrat Jo Mendoza when asked about the sprawling computing facilities increasingly proposed for Arizona. “Not right now, not in our district, not in our state.”
She is running to unseat Congressman Juan Ciscomani in Arizona’s 6th congressional district, who has publicly backed the energy infrastructure that makes data centers possible. Arizona has 98 operating data centers and 86 more planned or under construction.
“We can’t have data centers near residential areas. We still don’t know what the public health risks are there. Arizona State University is doing research on air-cooled data centers, and what they found with those is that they still emit a lot of heat, anywhere between two to four degrees more,” Mendoza said.
“If data centers are being put up next to residential areas, what do you think is going to happen to people’s energy bills? Those energy bills are going to go up. And again, we don’t know what the impacts on health are going to be, especially in such close proximity,” she added.
The retired Marine Corps gunnery sergeant, who spent 20 years in uniform before working for former Rep. Tom O’Halleran, has spent months warning that Arizona State University research shows air-cooled data centers can raise surrounding temperatures by two to four degrees. This is a serious concern in a state now that the federal government announced a 31% reduction in Arizona’s allocation of Colorado River water on July 25.
Enthusiastic donations
Fundraising numbers show Mendoza has translated that message into real financial momentum. According to Federal Election Commission filings, Mendoza raised roughly $2 million in the second quarter of 2026, compared with about $1.1 million for Ciscomani — continuing a pattern that has held for three straight quarters.
She has outraised the two-term Republican incumbent in fundraising hauls dating back to mid-2025, when she pulled in nearly $700,000 to his $459,000. Her first-quarter 2026 total, more than $2.4 million, more than doubled his roughly $1.1 million.
She contrasted her working-class biography — raised in a farm-working family in Pinal County, now a single mother juggling a congressional campaign — with what she cast as Ciscomani’s disconnect from constituents’ financial strain, saying voters have told her the incumbent has failed to show up and listen the way she has.
Read: Ciscomani Cheered Medicaid Cuts and Funding for ICE like a Carnival Barker
Ciscomani’s fundraising is built on deep-pocketed institutional support — PAC transfers from House Speaker Mike Johnson’s leadership fund, the pro-Israel group AIPAC, which has funneled roughly $350,000 to his campaign, and dozens of corporate political action committees.
In contrast, Mendoza has leaned on a grassroots donor base she describes as her campaign’s heartbeat. “Our average donation is still under $40,” she said at a recent LD18 Democrats meeting. “We have more than 100,000 individual supporters… and the majority of our money did not come from PACs. It came from everyday Arizonans and people across the nation who are pitching in what they can.”
She recounted a call to a retiree living on Social Security who pledged $5 a month through Election Day. “She wouldn’t be able to make phone calls, wouldn’t be able to knock doors, but that was her contribution,” Mendoza said. “I asked her to keep her money, and she said no, because that’s what she wanted to contribute to the fight.”
That grassroots energy, Mendoza argued, is rooted in one issue above all others: the price of everyday life. “What we hear repeatedly from folks is that the cost of living is unaffordable,” she said, pointing to Republican inflation driven by tariffs and the endless war in Iran. “People still can’t pay rent. They still can’t afford gas. They still can’t afford groceries,” Mendoza said.
She said the district’s 80,000 veterans and military families give her an opening with voters who might otherwise lean Republican. Conservative-leaning families are rattled by the war, saying, “I’ve got a kid that’s getting deployed to Iran,” Mendoza said, recounting conversations with “I even have had a couple of conservatives that have told me, ‘My kid’s over there right now, and I will not be voting for a single Republican in November.'”
Ciscomani voted twice in favor of the pointless, expensive war against Iraq. The war’s price tag has hit $80 billion — more than double what Congress was told. “Meanwhile, people still can’t pay rent, can’t afford gas, can’t afford groceries.”
“Marines fight to win, and we will win in November,” Mendoza told the crowd, invoking her military career. “The fiercest person outside of a Marine is a mom, and I’m both,” she said.
More information on Mendoza’s campaign is available at joannamendoza.com.
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