crypto and – A surge of crypto- and AI-funded super PAC spending—over $321 million in the 2026 cycle—pits industry-backed priorities against lawmakers’ regulatory agendas. With the Senate moving the Clarity Act in the middle of midterm season, AI and crypto groups are read
By the time voters reach Election Day in 2026, they may already feel the pressure—in ads, in attack mailers, and in the speed at which political money can flood a district once a deadline appears.
The scale of that money is no longer confined to the familiar spending lanes tied to party leadership. A review of Federal Election Commission filings shows that super PACs funded by the cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence industries have amassed more than $321 million in the 2026 cycle. with much more expected. The same filings describe a parallel arms race: super PACs are spending millions to knock out candidates they deem unsupportive of industry-favored regulation.
The latest tally matters not just because it’s large—though the review finds it’s already rivaling the size of the major spending groups controlled by the Democratic and Republican parties—but because it’s arriving with a specific demand list for Congress. Lawmakers are weighing foundational regulatory questions on crypto and AI, and both industries are pushing “light-touch” frameworks. The money, in turn, ensures industry preferences become impossible for congressional leaders to ignore while trying to protect their members.
That pressure is now colliding with real legislative motion. On May 14, the Senate Banking Committee advanced the Clarity Act, described as the crypto industry’s top legislative priority, after months of negotiation. The measure is set up for a full Senate vote.
The 2026 spending described in the filings spans 14 federal and state super PACs bankrolled by AI and crypto companies. But the figure is portrayed as incomplete—suggesting the AI industry’s pledged totals go further than what can be counted in the reported super PAC spending.
A new Republican-focused nonprofit aligned with the deregulatory AI agenda coming out of the Trump White House. Innovation Council Action. has pledged to spend $100 million in midterm contests. a move that could evolve into another super PAC. Tens of millions more dollars are said to be flowing into new “dark money” AI advocacy groups. including Public First Action. which is linked to an Anthropic-funded nonprofit effort.
The person putting a spotlight on what this kind of spending does to the system is Daniel Weiner. director of the Brennan Center’s Elections and Government Program. He said. “The campaign finance landscape. and the lack of any real limits. has opened up this opportunity for industries that have a very clear agenda. ” adding that “we see AI. crypto. and some of these Big Tech companies really leaning into that.”.
In this cycle’s crypto universe, the playbook is already proven. In the 2024 cycle. the crypto-firm-funded Fairshake super PAC network set a record for independent expenditures by an industry-funded group—shelling out more than $133 million to target lawmakers seen as not on board with its policy agenda while promoting candidates aligned with it.
Fairshake funneled funds to party-specific super PACs for ads that made zero mention of crypto. An allied nonprofit advocacy group launched by Coinbase, Stand With Crypto, handed out scorecards to the industry’s cheerleaders and critics.
Fairshake and its two super PAC affiliates ended the first quarter with $170.4 million in cash on hand. That amount is set alongside the Senate Leadership Fund’s $166.4 million. illustrating how quickly industry-backed political spending can land in the same league as the biggest traditional outside efforts.
This year, Fairshake and newer pro-crypto super PACs have made nearly $51 million in independent expenditures. One joiner is the Digital Freedom Fund. launched last year by the crypto billionaire Winklevoss twins; the group has given around $21 million in Bitcoin. described as not yet liquidated. with cash on hand under a million. Another new pro-crypto spender is the Republican-focused Fellowship PAC. funded largely with $10 million from Cantor Fitzgerald. the Wall Street firm now run by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick’s sons and described as holding multibillion-dollar positions in crypto.
Fellowship PAC has praised President Trump’s crypto moves, touted $100 million in pledges when it was announced in September, and held around $8 million cash on hand as of the end of March.
The money is moving while lawmakers fight over how to regulate the underlying markets. The Clarity Act is described as crypto’s flagship market-structure bill. It advanced by a vote of 15–9 out of the GOP-led Senate Banking Committee after battles with the bank lobby over stablecoin yields and objections from Democratic lawmakers over the Trump family’s crypto ventures.
At the center of the debate is the regulatory line between the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission. The bill would put most digital tokens under the lighter-touch CFTC, compared with the more robust SEC. The crypto industry, the coverage notes, is racing to get the measure through the Senate before midterm-season gridlock sets in.
Senator Bernie Moreno (R-OH) is not just a bystander in that push. His 2024 victory over Sherrod Brown was bankrolled by $40.1 million in Fairshake spending. At the DC Blockchain Summit, Moreno told the audience that the end of May is a de facto deadline for the bill’s passage.
AI groups are racing on a parallel track, also centered on whether federal rules will override state regulation. The question in Congress, as described, is federal preemption of state regulations pushed by companies including OpenAI and major technology firms like Meta.
Since 2025. states have seen a surge in measures seeking to set AI safety precautions in areas ranging from deepfake videos to chatbot disclosures to consumer protections. The AI super PAC described as most focused on that fight is Leading the Future. which launched in January with $125 million in announced funding.
Leading the Future is calling for a national AI framework aligned with the Trump administration’s December executive order. It also advocates for a federal approach that would preempt the AI laws that 38 states enacted in 2025, along with new safety measures advancing this year.
For the money behind it. the review says the announced haul included around $70 million in cash on hand as of the end of the first quarter. It lists $25 million from OpenAI president Greg Brockman and his spouse, and the same amount from a16z. Other donations named include Palantir cofounder Joe Lonsdale and Silicon Valley investor Ron Conway. Like Fairshake. the group is described as splitting funds between two party-focused super PACs and rolling out a candidate scorecard. with the detail that it shares staff with Fairshake.
Other AI-funded political vehicles are tied to different corners of the policy world. Anthropic seeded a new nonprofit, Public First Action, with $20 million announced in February. Public First Action says it “strongly supports” state efforts on AI safety rules and opposes federal preemption. The nonprofit is said to have birthed three super PACs. though Anthropic later said its donations weren’t intended for federal election spending—leaving the original source of the super PACs’ spending money in the dark.
In New York’s 12th Congressional District Democratic primary. the affiliate Jobs and Democracy PAC has spent $2.3 million supporting state Assemblyman Alex Bores. who is author of the state AI safety bill the RAISE Act. Bores. the coverage says. has been hit with nearly $3.3 million in attack ads by Leading the Future’s affiliate Think Big. which is described as making virtually no mention of AI regulation.
Another new super PAC in the district is You Can Push Back, funded by Ripple cofounder and tech billionaire Chris Larsen, which announced plans to quickly spend $3.5 million backing Bores’s primary bid.
Meta’s spending footprint is described as state-focused as well. Meta announced two state-focused spending groups last fall: a super PAC named Mobilizing Economic Transformation Across (Meta) California and a 527 nonprofit named the American Technology Excellence Project. Together, they pledged $65 million to promote aligned state candidates.
On the Republican side, Innovation Council Action debuted in March, with pledges to spend more than $100 million. The review says it is led by former Trump campaign official Taylor Budowich and aligned with Trump AI and crypto adviser David Sacks.
Still, the biggest cash stack in the report belongs to a different kind of alliance: MAGA Inc., the spending arm of term-limited President Trump. It is reported as sitting on $347.8 million as of March 31, with plans to spend for GOP allies in the midterms.
Weiner called the relationship between that super PAC and the President especially revealing. saying. “It’s not just that this super PAC can raise unlimited amounts of money. but it is very consciously President Trump’s super PAC—this idea that they are separate is purely a legal fiction.” He added that this structure “allows it to become such a vector for corruption and what amounts to gaining access and influence.”.
Donors named in the coverage for MAGA Inc. include Crypto.com’s parent company, OpenAI’s Brockman, the Gemini crypto exchange, the Winklevoss twins, xAI’s Elon Musk, and a16z founders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. The report says these donors have combined for tens of millions given.
For Congress. the question now is whether the financial tide will help drive the regulatory agenda—or whether lawmakers will find a way to move slower than the spending cycle demands. The review points to uncertainty on both fronts: whether GOP-controlled Congress will get crypto’s flagship CLARITY Act to a Senate vote this year. and whether the next Congress will be willing to consider substantive AI safety legislation.
The year ahead, in other words, is being shaped not only by committees and floor schedules, but by the nine-figure sums about to be dumped on voters in House and Senate races—money that arrives with a regulatory mission attached.
super PACs crypto AI Federal Election Commission Clarity Act Senate Banking Committee Leading the Future Fairshake MAGA Inc. election spending political money federal preemption AI safety
So basically rich tech bros buying elections again.
I don’t even get it, like why is crypto in politics? Next thing you know the Clarity Act is gonna decide what coins are allowed or something. Sounds like they’re panicking before Election Day.
Wait, the Clarity Act is in the middle of midterm season… so that means 2026 voters are getting hit with ads already? I thought midterms were the big money time, not the next cycle. Also $321 million sounds fake, like where’s that number coming from, did they count Facebook ads too?
This reads like the AI and crypto people are trying to silence lawmakers with “attack mailers,” and honestly I’m just tired. They say it’s regulatory agendas but then it turns into knocking out candidates, so what’s the point of any of it. If super PAC money can flood a district once a deadline appears, then nobody’s actually voting anymore, they’re just reacting to whatever gets mailed first. Kinda feels rigged, even if everyone says it’s just politics.