By Eduardo Bacci, The Investigative Journal
With six months until the November midterms, the 2026 cycle is on track to become the most expensive non-presidential election in American history. Industry projections compiled by AdImpact and cited by OpenSecrets place total political advertising at roughly $10.8 billion, with Senate spending estimated near $2.8 billion and House spending crossing $2 billion for the first time. The April quarterly reports filed with the Federal Election Commission on April 15 — together with mid-cycle disclosures from independent expenditure committees and a handful of 24-hour notices filed through May — show where that money is sitting and, increasingly, who is moving it.
The Senate war chest: Republicans pre-fund, Democrats out-raise
The largest single number in the May filings comes from outside money. The Senate Leadership Fund, the GOP-aligned super PAC tied to Senate Majority Leader John Thune, and its affiliated 501(c)(4) One Nation, raised a combined $72 million in the first quarter of 2026 and ended March with roughly $166 million on hand, according to reporting by The Hill and Deseret News. The group also disclosed a $342 million reservation plan targeting eight Senate races — described by officials as the largest single battle-plan commitment in the committee’s history. One Nation, the affiliated social-welfare arm, has previously transferred $35.3 million to Senate Leadership Fund this cycle, a flow visible on FEC filings but with original donors shielded by 501(c)(4) disclosure rules.
The Democratic counterpart, Senate Majority PAC, reported $56 million in Q1 receipts and roughly $75 million on hand at quarter’s end. For 2025, Senate Majority PAC’s nonprofit family raised about $108 million against Senate Leadership Fund’s $180 million, per OpenSecrets and NBC News. The roughly $72 million super-PAC gap, however, is partly offset at the candidate level: filings show Democrats are out-raising Republicans head-to-head in most of the cycle’s competitive races.
Sen. Jon Ossoff (D-Ga.) remains the cycle’s leading hard-money fundraiser. His Q1 report disclosed $12.4 million raised, $7.9 million spent, and $31.7 million in cash on hand, according to FEC documents summarized by Quiver Quantitative and the Georgia Recorder. Ossoff has raised roughly $57.3 million through the first quarter of the cycle, with 99.5 percent coming from individual donors — a small-dollar profile that OpenSecrets contrasts sharply with his likely Republican challenger Rep. Buddy Carter, who has reported about $6.7 million in receipts. In North Carolina, Sen. Thom Tillis (R) — recently announced as not seeking reelection in some scenarios under discussion in state party circles — reported $2.3 million raised in Q1 and $4 million on hand, per Washington Times reporting on the filings. In Texas, Democratic nominee James Talarico’s $27 million Q1 haul placed him second only to Ossoff among Senate candidates this cycle.
Crypto and AI: the new front of outside money
The most consequential new entrants on the 2026 map are industry-aligned super PACs in cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence. Fairshake and its affiliates — Defend American Jobs and Protect Progress — entered 2026 with what Axios and CNBC reported as a $193 million war chest. By late May 2026, the broader industry’s outside spending capacity had climbed past $271 million, according to Crypto Times. Filings indicate Fairshake-affiliated committees deployed roughly $5 million backing Rep. Barry Moore (R-Ala.) in a competitive Republican Senate primary, and additional sums supporting Rep. French Hill (R-Ark.), chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.
Through the May 26 Texas runoffs, crypto-aligned outside spending claimed what one spokesperson called a “6-0 sweep” across recent Georgia, Kentucky, and Alabama primaries, with roughly $20 million in combined media buys, per CoinDesk. The Texas-18 runoff produced the most prominent result of the month: Rep. Al Green (D), a longtime industry critic, was defeated after a wave of crypto-aligned spending. The cycle’s most prominent loss for the industry came earlier in Illinois, where Fairshake spent roughly $8 to $10 million opposing Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton in her Democratic Senate primary; Stratton prevailed with more than 40 percent of the vote, per The American Prospect.
On the AI side, The Nation and The Intercept reported that the new pro-AI super PAC Leading The Future received a $25 million contribution from venture firm Andreessen Horowitz in the most recent reporting period. Separately, financial-services firm Cantor Fitzgerald disclosed a $10 million contribution to Fellowship PAC, an additional crypto-aligned super PAC that booked roughly $11 million in Q1 receipts.
AIPAC and the rise of shell super PACs
Pro-Israel committees aligned with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee remained the cycle’s most active single network in Democratic primaries. AIPAC’s super PAC, United Democracy Project (UDP), entered 2026 with what Legis1 reported as more than $100 million available to spend, and the broader AIPAC network has tracked engagement across 539 members of Congress totaling approximately $209.3 million in cumulative contributions, per Gen Us.
The notable May development was the proliferation of shell super PACs disclosing AIPAC-linked donors only after independent expenditures landed. In Illinois, “Elect Chicago Women” and “Affordable Chicago Now” — two committees identified by reporting as AIPAC-funded — collectively reported millions in independent expenditures across Democratic primaries in IL-2, IL-7, IL-8, and IL-9, with UDP itself disclosing at least $5 million directly. In Michigan, the Detroit News reported a previously unknown committee spent $5 million boosting Rep. Haley Stevens in her Senate primary; subsequent disclosures linked the spending to AIPAC’s network. Records suggest this routing approach — using newly formed committees with generic names to obscure the funding source until post-primary filings — is becoming a standard feature of pro-Israel independent expenditures in contested Democratic primaries.
Mega-donors, dark money, and the industry pipeline
April filings confirmed Miriam Adelson, widow of Sheldon Adelson, as the cycle’s largest individual donor to Republican-aligned super PACs, with $40 million disclosed across multiple committees per a tally by The National Pulse citing FEC records. On the 501(c)(4) side, Issue One reported that the Koch-aligned Americans for Prosperity network, including Stand Together and Stand Together Chamber of Commerce, contributed approximately $8.6 million to political committees in the period reported. The same data set shows trade associations and industry-aligned 501(c)(4)s have moved more than $50 million in dark money since December 2024, with the top contributors including the American Petroleum Institute, the crypto-focused Solana Institute, the National Community Pharmacist Association, AdvaMed, PhRMA, and the Pharmaceutical Care Management Association.
Foreign-connected PACs — domestic U.S. subsidiaries of foreign-owned companies whose American employees may contribute through registered committees — continue to operate at familiar volumes, with no enforcement actions against them disclosed in May. Filings suggest the front-group story of 2026 is not foreign money but domestic industry money routed through shell PACs and 501(c)(4) intermediaries.
Scam PACs and FEC enforcement posture
The Federal Election Commission continued its multi-year posture on so-called scam PACs — committees that solicit small donations with the implication of supporting candidates but disburse most of their funds to vendors controlled by the committee’s organizers. According to a recent Campaigns & Elections report, the Commission unanimously approved Audit Division recommendation memorandums against Freedom’s Defense Fund and Conservative Majority Fund, both of which employed Scott Mackenzie as treasurer during the periods under review. Separately, the Campaign Legal Center filed complaints alleging that “Patriots for American Leadership” and “Campaign for a Conservative Majority” used President Trump’s voice on robocalls and false claims of supporting his reelection efforts to defraud small donors — allegations the committees have not publicly addressed.
The structural pattern in current scam PAC complaints is consistent: high operating expenses, large disbursements to vendors that share addresses or principals with the PAC’s organizers, and disbursements to actual candidates that account for a small fraction — often well under five percent — of receipts.
State-level: the Steyer test in California
At the state level, the most striking single number is in California, where Democratic billionaire and former presidential candidate Tom Steyer’s gubernatorial campaign has spent or booked more than $195 million in broadcast, cable, and radio advertising, per PBS News — what reporting describes as the most expensive political advertising operation in the country. California’s per-election contribution limit of $36,400 for gubernatorial candidates is the highest of any state with limits and remains a key reason self-funded candidates are common in the race.
What warrants deeper TIJ investigation
Three money flows stand out from the May data and merit follow-up reporting in coming editions of Campaign Finance Watch. First, the proliferating shell-PAC architecture around AIPAC’s network — newly formed committees with generic civic-sounding names appearing in the final weeks of contested primaries — creates a disclosure lag that effectively delays donor identification until after voters have cast ballots. Records suggest similar techniques are being adopted by crypto-aligned spending in close races. Second, the Solana Institute’s emergence as a top dark-money contributor warrants tracing: the 501(c)(4) is a relatively new entrant compared with industry incumbents like the American Petroleum Institute and PhRMA, and its political-spending posture appears closely aligned with Fairshake’s. Third, the pattern of audit findings against Mackenzie-treasured committees suggests the FEC may be moving toward a more aggressive scam-PAC enforcement posture in 2026 — a development worth tracking against the Commission’s historically narrow statutory authority.
The Investigative Journal will continue tracking 2026 cycle filings monthly. Tips on specific committees, donor patterns, or independent expenditure operations may be submitted via the TIJ tip line.
Sources: FEC.gov filings (committee pages linked above); OpenSecrets dark-money and super-PAC databases; Issue One 2026 dark-money report; Campaign Legal Center complaints; reporting from The Hill, NBC News, Axios, CNBC, CoinDesk, Detroit News, Georgia Recorder, The American Prospect, The Intercept, The Nation, Legis1, Gen Us, PBS News, and Quiver Quantitative as linked above.