Super PACs focused on artificial intelligence have made $81.3 million in independent expenditures in the 2026 election cycle, by our arithmetic from Federal Election Commission filings received through 30 October. The six super PACs in the Public First network reported $43.8 million, and the three spending super PACs in the Leading the Future network reported $37.5 million, a gap of $6.3 million.
Theo Jaffee posted on X on 2 November that “AI safety super PACs have far outspent their opponents in the 2026 midterms,” with a chart from Transformer’s AI Campaign Finance Tracker showing $44.39 million against $27.90 million. The filings we read support the direction of that claim but show a narrower gap: they put American Mission, one of the Leading the Future-funded PACs, at $16.31 million in independent expenditures, where the chart shows $6.71 million.
Results update (02:24Z, 4 Nov). The NY-12 spending in this piece was in the 23 June Democratic primary, which Micah Lasher won, according to the New York City Board of Elections’ certified results. In the 3 November general election for NY-12, AP has called the race for Micah Lasher (Dem), as of 02:24Z on 4 November.
Results from AP race calls and official election offices; uncalled races are marked uncalled. This box will be updated.
Independent expenditures in the 2026 cycle. Source: FEC filings (latest periodic reports plus 24- and 48-hour reports received through 30 October 2026). Network totals and the 1.9x ratio are our arithmetic. Chart: FourWeekMBA.
The key insight: By our arithmetic from FEC filings received through 30 October, AI-focused super PACs have made $81.3 million in independent expenditures this cycle: $43.8 million from the six Public First-network PACs and $37.5 million from the three spending Leading the Future-network PACs, a gap of $6.3 million.
We used two FEC data sets downloaded on 2 November. The first is each committee’s latest periodic report, which gives independent expenditures, receipts and cash on hand up to a coverage end date. The second is the 24- and 48-hour reports super PACs file as they spend close to an election. To each committee’s periodic total we added the 24- and 48-hour spending dated after that report’s coverage end date, keeping only the latest version of amended entries.
On that basis, Think Big has spent $18.70 million and American Mission $16.31 million, both through periodic reports covering spending to 14 October plus later 24- and 48-hour reports. Building the Future has reported $2.51 million in 24- and 48-hour reports. Leading the Future itself reported no independent expenditures, $75.98 million in receipts and $23.82 million in cash on hand through 14 October.
In the Public First network, Jobs and Democracy PAC has spent $18.47 million, Defending Our Values PAC $7.88 million, Tomorrow Together $7.04 million, You Can Push Back $4.32 million, Guardrails Alliance $3.62 million and Dream NYC $2.48 million. The grouping of committees into the two networks follows Transformer’s tracker; the dollar figures are our sums from the filings.
What Was Posted on X
Contrary to popular belief, AI safety super PACs have far outspent their opponents in the 2026 midterms
Theo Jaffee posted on 2 November that AI safety super PACs have far outspent their opponents in the 2026 midterms, with a chart from Transformer’s AI Campaign Finance Tracker showing $44.39 million against $27.90 million. Our own sums from FEC filings show the same direction with a $6.3 million gap.
Independent expenditures by AI-focused super PACs in the 2026 cycle. Source: FEC filings (latest periodic reports plus 24- and 48-hour reports received through 30 October 2026), pulled 2 November. Network grouping per Transformer’s AI Campaign Finance Tracker. Sums are our arithmetic.
The Post and the Chart
The chart Jaffee posted labels the Public First network as “Funded largely by Public First Action, which has received at least $20M from Anthropic” and the Leading the Future network as “backed by a16z and Greg & Anna Brockman.” Its footnote adds that Anthropic says its donations to Public First Action are restricted to policy and public-education work, not election spending.
For four of the six Public First-network PACs, the chart’s figures are within $0.5 million of our sums. The differences are larger for Tomorrow Together, where the chart shows $6.12 million against our $7.04 million, for Guardrails Alliance, $5.01 million against our $3.62 million, and for American Mission. We have not established how the tracker treats amended or late filings, which can explain differences of this kind.
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One House Primary Took a Third
The 24- and 48-hour reports show $27.26 million spent in a single race: the Democratic primary in New York’s 12th congressional district, where Alexander Bores was a candidate. Jobs and Democracy PAC reported $13.17 million supporting Bores, You Can Push Back $3.34 million, Dream NYC $2.43 million and Guardrails Alliance $0.28 million. Think Big reported $8.04 million opposing him.
By our arithmetic, that one primary equals 33.5% of the $81.3 million the two networks have spent; the race figure comes from the 24- and 48-hour reports alone, so it is not on exactly the same basis as the network totals. American Mission’s reports show its spending spread across Senate and House races in states including South Carolina, Georgia, Texas, Kentucky and Montana.
Connecting the Coverage
On 19 October we reported, in Anthropic Allies vs a16z, that Think Big and American Mission had reported $28.1 million in independent expenditures through 31 August, against $25.2 million for Jobs and Democracy PAC and Defending Our Values PAC through 30 September. That piece also reported that Think Big and American Mission each listed $22,500,000 received from Leading the Future. On 30 October, in OpenAI-Linked PAC Has $34M, we reported Puck’s count that pro-regulation groups had outspent Leading the Future’s network $40 million to $36 million. The latest filings put the totals at $43.8 million and $37.5 million.
The crypto industry’s super PACs Fairshake, Protect Progress and Defend American Jobs have reported $155.9 million in independent expenditures this cycle on the same basis, 1.9 times the two AI networks combined, by our arithmetic. Fairshake alone reported $138.24 million in receipts and $32.98 million in cash on hand through 14 October.
The Structural Read
As we read the filings, the direction of the claim in the post holds, but the gap is narrower than the chart shows, mainly because the filings put American Mission at $16.31 million rather than $6.71 million.
As we read the race-level reports, the money is concentrated: the 24- and 48-hour reports show $27.26 million in one House primary in New York’s 12th district, equal to 33.5% of the two networks’ total by our arithmetic.
Theo Jaffee, on X, 2 November 2026
“Contrary to popular belief, AI safety super PACs have far outspent their opponents in the 2026 midterms”
Three Implications
FOR THE TWO AI NETWORKS The filings show the Public First network at $43.8 million and the Leading the Future network at $37.5 million; Leading the Future itself reported $23.82 million in cash on hand through 14 October.
FOR ONE HOUSE RACE Spending for and against Alexander Bores in the NY-12 Democratic primary totals $27.26 million in the 24- and 48-hour reports.
FOR SCALE The crypto super PACs Fairshake, Protect Progress and Defend American Jobs reported $155.9 million, 1.9 times the two AI networks combined, by our arithmetic.
The framework reads: “The supercycle has a ceiling now, and the ceiling is political.”
As we read it, the super PAC filings are one place where that political layer shows up in dollars. The framework is the owner’s argument and does not discuss these committees or the 2026 elections.
The filings do not show how much of each network’s money came from any single company, and we have not traced the transfers between the networks’ parent committees and the spending PACs ourselves; the network grouping is Transformer’s. Spending disseminated after 30 October may not yet appear in FEC data. Independent expenditures measure money spent, not whether it affected any result.
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FEC filings received through 30 October show AI-focused super PACs have spent $81.3 million on the 2026 elections, with the Public First network at $43.8 million and the Leading the Future network at $37.5 million. About a third of that amount went into one New York House primary, according to the 24- and 48-hour reports.
A note on sourcing. Committee figures are from Federal Election Commission bulk data downloaded on 2 November 2026: each committee’s latest periodic report plus 24- and 48-hour independent expenditure reports received through 30 October, with amendments de-duplicated. Totals, gaps and shares are our arithmetic. The grouping of committees into networks follows Transformer’s AI Campaign Finance Tracker. We did not contact the committees or candidates.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
