A New York Democratic candidate pushed for an in-person debate with a $100 million pro-AI super PAC backed by OpenAI, Anthropic’s ally finds a different lane in politics, and the pro-AI campaign ecosystem is now split into rival networks aimed at each other th
The risk isn’t just that money will talk in the midterms. It’s that the people funding pro-AI political groups now see each other as targets.
On Tuesday, Alex Bores—an New York Democrat congressional candidate whose campaign leans heavily on promoting AI regulation—challenged Leading the Future, the $100 million pro-AI super PAC, to an in-person, real-world debate.
The stakes are built into the timeline. Bores said Leading the Future could pick the moderator and could pick its own representative. but it had to commit to the debate before the June 23rd primary. The campaign’s conditions were laid out in a press release. The likelihood of the debate happening is slim to none: Leading the Future declined to comment about the debate challenge.
It’s a fast escalation of a pattern that’s been taking shape for months—AI industry super PACs developing not just political influence, but political identities, and then using those identities to fight each other.
When Leading the Future was launched last year. it looked like a fairly typical super PAC in structure: backed by several wealthy individuals and companies with shared policy goals. operating at both the state and federal election level. The legal backbone for that style of political spending traces back to the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling. which found that corporations have a right to free speech. That decision helped create special campaign finance vehicles that allow corporations and wealthy donors to donate unlimited sums to political advocacy groups.
But the internal logic of that “shared policy goals” umbrella didn’t stay shared.
After Meta announced that it was launching its own AI-focused super PACs. it became harder to treat Leading the Future as representing the whole AI industry. Meta’s move suggested that the company’s AI interests—political and otherwise—weren’t necessarily aligned with the entities funding Leading the Future.
Over time, Leading the Future came to be viewed less as a vehicle for the general AI industry and more as a vehicle for OpenAI specifically, especially as several of Leading the Future’s backers are investors in the frontier AI company.
That perception hardened earlier this year when Anthropic donated $20 million to Public First Action. a bipartisan super PAC network that is backing Bores. Bores’ campaign language and framing tied the chess pieces together: Public First became synonymous with Anthropic and “doomerism” in Leading the Future’s terms. while Leading the Future—again. in Bores’ framing—was known as the “Marc Andreessen-Greg Brockman-Joe Lonsdale-backed Leading the Future super PAC.”.
Super PACs aren’t allowed to coordinate with candidates on things like ad buys and messaging. Still. the tactic is different in feel when money is used to attack corporate rivals rather than simply to boost or oppose candidates. Bores can plausibly distance himself from any Anthropic-funded political shenanigans on his behalf because coordination rules limit direct coordination between super PACs and candidates—corporate money remains corporate money.
The campaign finance world behind these groups is not only competitive but also opaque in ways that keep reputations—and suspicion—moving faster than disclosure.
The piece of the ecosystem described here gets even murkier with a “dark money nonprofit” that might start aiming fire at Leading the Future in order to appease Trump. The New York Times is referenced as describing Leading the Future as too bipartisan to be trusted by Republicans.
In March, a pro-AI political advocacy messaging nonprofit called Innovation Council Action revealed itself to the public. It is run by Donald Trump’s former adviser Taylor Budowich and already boasted a $100 million war chest. It received the “blessing” of a recurring Regulator character. David Sacks. a former White House special adviser on AI and crypto.
Innovation Council Action is focused explicitly on promoting Trump’s AI agenda. That focus also sets up a new fault line inside the Republican Party: populist-leaning candidates who are unwilling to cave to whatever pro-industry positions Donald Trump has been convinced to repeat at any given time.
Who is pushing the agenda through Innovation Council Action is not disclosed. Innovation Council Action is described as a “dark money nonprofit,” meaning its donors do not legally have to be disclosed in the way super PACs’ funding typically does.
The political fights around AI don’t stay confined to AI companies and election committees. In Congress, another technology is colliding with regulation: prediction markets.
Prediction markets. as described here. are stuck in a regulatory no man’s land—whether trading on prediction markets is gambling or something else that deserves separate legislation. The Senate Commerce Committee is holding its first hearing on sports betting and prediction markets. Patrick McHenry. who is described as the former Republican chair of the House Financial Services Committee before leaving Congress to join a16z and become a crypto lobbyist. will be testifying as a representative for a new industry advocacy group called the Coalition for Prediction Markets.
Around the hearing, the coalition-building is just as pointed. The gaming industry—casinos and the like—futures market players, traditional sports betting, and any industry that thinks prediction markets threaten their business are described as sharing a dislike of prediction markets.
FairPredicts is identified as a “watchdog” group that has launched a six-figure ad buy timed for the Senate hearing. The ads are set to appear in Washington in metro stations and digital. as well as on buses circling Capitol Hill. The ad effort is described as a direct parody of Kalshi’s giant green ads from earlier this year.
Even when the issues change—from prediction markets to stablecoins—the underlying theme is the same: industries forming alliances to push back against Big Tech politics, then finding unlikely partners.
The Clarity Act’s Senate Banking Committee markup last week moved through quickly, passing with a 15–9 vote after roughly three hours of debate, including two Democrats. The bill would create a financial framework around stablecoins and has already been surrounded by drama.
Coinbase is said to have dramatically revoked its support over interest yields. Traditional banks are described as having a meltdown in response. Throughout, the looming midterms are framed as an ever-present backdrop.
But the drama is not over, procedurally or politically. The described path includes reconciliation, a Senate floor vote, the bill returning to the House, and whatever political shenanigans occur between then and now.
Politically, the opposition is said to be coming from a growing number of normally misaligned industry groups. The police unions are described as thinking the Clarity Act would prevent law enforcement from tracking money laundering. Labor unions are described as thinking it would drain workers’ pension funds.
And the story ends where it began: with a sense that technology is pushing politics into ever tighter. more combative spirals—just as the newsroom prepares for a different kind of collision. The writer notes a recess and hopes that politics and technology will not “crash out at the intersection” while out. which is framed as a lot to ask for.
AI regulation super PAC elections Anthropic OpenAI Leading the Future Alex Bores Public First Action Innovation Council Action prediction markets Senate Commerce Committee Clarity Act stablecoins