The War Got Personal — and Specific

When we last covered this story, the headline was the raw dollar figures: $321 million flowing from crypto and AI super PACs into the 2026 midterms. Now we have names, races, attack ads, and shell companies. The story got a lot dirtier.

According to the Washington Post, North Carolina Democrat Nida Allam was mounting a primary challenge against incumbent Rep. Valerie Foushee when a five-day ad blitz hit in February — TV, radio, and social media — painting Foushee as a radical liberal. Foushee co-chairs a Democratic House commission on artificial intelligence. The timing raised questions about whether the ads were directly targeting her role in AI oversight.

Two Silicon Valley Giants, Two Competing PACs

The New York Times reports this is effectively a proxy war between two of the biggest names in AI. One super PAC is allied with Anthropic. The other is tied to OpenAI. They are reportedly spending millions — against each other — to shape which lawmakers end up overseeing AI policy.

Two companies that publicly claim to care about AI safety are bankrolling political hit jobs on members of Congress in competing primaries simultaneously.

According to Wired, the largest of the pro-AI PACs is called Leading the Future, backed by more than $100 million from venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, plus OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman and his wife Anna Brockman. The group's spokesman, Josh Vlasto, told Wired their explicit goal is to kill state-level AI regulation and push a national framework instead — one with less teeth.

"We are looking to advance a national regulatory framework for AI and avoid the patchwork of states," Vlasto said. He framed this as protecting kids and beating China. The position also protects OpenAI from state regulations in New York, California, and Colorado that require AI developers to disclose safety practices.

The Shell Game Is Getting Sophisticated

The tracking of funding sources reveals a deliberate concealment strategy. The Intercept traced a $5 million TV ad buy in the Michigan Senate Democratic primary — boosting candidate Haley Stevens — to a group called the Center for Democratic Priorities. That group was incorporated in Delaware just seven months ago, has zero track record in Michigan, and used the same consulting firm tied to an AIPAC-affiliated super PAC. AIPAC denied involvement. Voters may not find out the real source for months, thanks to FEC disclosure deadlines.

This tactic — what campaign finance lawyers call "pop-up" super PACs — is now being copied directly by the AI and crypto industries, according to the Intercept. These groups split into Democratic- and Republican-aligned affiliates for two reasons: it obscures the original funding source, and it lets them tap partisan donors who won't give to a bipartisan group.

Shanna Ports, senior legal counsel at the Campaign Legal Center and a former FEC enforcement attorney, said: "All their spending on election ads immediately before a primary or general election is anonymous to voters — particularly when they use names that have no meaning."

The White House Connection

This spending surge occurs alongside action at the executive level. Wired notes that White House AI czar David Sacks has repeatedly argued that American AI dominance over China is existential. In December, President Trump signed an executive order directing Attorney General Pam Bondi to challenge state AI laws that conflict with looser federal policy.

The industry's electoral spending aligns with an executive branch already moving to block state regulations. The PAC money operates in tandem with administration policy.

What This Means for Voters

If you vote in a congressional primary this cycle, there is a real chance the ads you see were funded by a Delaware shell company that didn't exist a year ago, backed by a billionaire venture capitalist whose portfolio companies stand to gain billions from the regulatory outcome those ads are designed to produce — and you won't find out until long after the election, if ever.

This is what unlimited, semi-anonymous political money looks like in practice. It doesn't look like a Super Bowl ad with a logo. It looks like a five-day blitz against a congresswoman in North Carolina, from a group nobody's ever heard of, with a name that tells you nothing.

The AI industry is playing electoral politics at scale. And right now, the disclosure rules are not keeping up.