Crypto Industry Spends About $176 Million in U.S. Midterm Races
U.S. PoliticsWell-covered
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The Facts
- Crypto-aligned groups have spent about $176 million across more than 100 U.S. midterm races.
- The spending supports candidates from both major parties.
- Fairshake is the largest crypto-aligned super PAC involved in the election spending.
- Fairshake and affiliated PACs spent about $150.8 million through Oct. 20.
- Coinbase, Ripple and Andreessen Horowitz are among Fairshake’s major financial backers.
- The campaign seeks durable congressional support for crypto policy after Trump leaves office.
- Fairshake said 53 of 58 candidates it backed in primary or special elections advanced.
Context
What is Fairshake?
Fairshake is a super PAC backed by major crypto companies and investors, including Coinbase, Ripple and Andreessen Horowitz. It and affiliated PACs have led crypto-aligned election spending this cycle. TokenPost FinanceFeeds TokenPost
Why are crypto groups spending in the midterms?
Industry strategists describe the spending as a long-term effort to build bipartisan congressional support for digital-asset policy and regulation beyond Trump’s time in office. U.S. News & World R… FinanceFeeds crypto.news
How much of the spending comes from Fairshake?
Fairshake and its affiliates spent about $150.8 million through Oct. 20, compared with roughly $25 million from other crypto-backed groups. CryptoCrunchApp Bitcoin Magazine FinanceFeeds TokenPost crypto.news
Where Left and Right agree, and where they split
- Where Left and Right agree
- Roughly $176 million from crypto-aligned PACs, led by Fairshake's $150.8 million backed by Coinbase, Ripple, and Andreessen Horowitz, is funding bipartisan candidates to lock in congressional support that survives Trump's presidency.
- Where Left and Right split
- Whether this is an industry buying legislative outcomes it should instead be regulated into accepting, or an industry seeking the durable statutory certainty it cannot get from executive favor alone.
- Why they won’t converge
- This is a values divide over campaign finance itself: whether unlimited industry PAC spending to shape Congress is corrupting influence-buying or a legitimate response to regulatory uncertainty, a disagreement no spending tally resolves.
- Watch for
- Fairshake's $55 million push against Sherrod Brown in Ohio's Senate race, despite Senate rules barring him from reclaiming his Banking Committee seniority even if he wins, tests whether the spending actually buys outcomes.semafor.com
How left and right read it
Legislation should be written by people answerable to voters, not purchased in advance by the firms it will govern. That principle is what roughly $176 million across more than 100 races tests, because Fairshake and its affiliates — funded by Coinbase, Ripple and Andreessen Horowitz — spent about $150.8 million through Oct. 20 to secure congressional support that outlasts Trump. Members should refuse it and regulate the industry buying them.
An industry that lives on permission rather than settled law cannot plan past the next administration, which is why roughly $176 million across more than 100 races — $150.8 million of it from Fairshake and its affiliated PACs through Oct. 20 — chases congressional support meant to outlast Trump. Candidates in both parties drew backing. So Congress should answer with durable, permissive statute rather than leave builders on borrowed time.
The receipts — 17 sources
Wire services (2)
Independent coverage (15)
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