{"id":6713,"date":"2026-02-27T18:15:28","date_gmt":"2026-02-27T18:15:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/?p=6713"},"modified":"2026-02-27T18:15:28","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T18:15:28","slug":"ads-funded-by-ai-industry-are-flooding-the-2026-election-theyre-about-everything-except-ai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/foreignnewstoday.com\/?p=6713","title":{"rendered":"Ads funded by AI industry are flooding the 2026 election. They’re about everything except AI."},"content":{"rendered":"


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Competing super PACs backed by the AI industry, flush with tens of millions of dollars, are already pouring money into the 2026 midterms, starting with the year\u2019s first primaries in Texas and North Carolina. <\/p>\n

There\u2019s just one thing missing from their ads so far: any reference to artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n

The groups are seeking to shape how AI models and companies are regulated nationwide, a debate that big players in AI see as existential for the future of the industry, the United States and the world. But instead of the actual policy reason they are taking sides in these primaries, the groups are leaning into red meat or progressive messaging on other hot-button issues.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a tactic also used by groups in other areas<\/a>. But the early AI-backed spending on ads about Immigration and Customs Enforcement, President Donald Trump, health care and more is especially notable because of the dramatic scale of change AI titans expect their product to bring to the American workforce and society.<\/p>\n

The forces behind the super PACs are also funding large nonprofits that could spend big to shift public opinion on AI moving forward. For now, though, their big issue is not figuring in their big political campaigns.<\/p>\n

So far, two rival umbrella organizations have dominated the AI spending in congressional races. Leading the Future \u2014 which has received significant funding from OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman and his wife, Anna Brockman, as well as venture capitalists Marc Andreessen and Benjamin Horowitz \u2014 is one major super PAC<\/a> pushing a national framework for AI and criticizing the prospect of different state regulations governing the industry.<\/p>\n

Leading the Future had $39 million banked away<\/a> at the end of last year and is wading into races via a pair of connected groups, one associated with each party: Think Big, which backs Democrats, and American Mission, which supports Republicans. <\/p>\n

Public First, another super PAC, is seeking to counter Leading the Future and its network. The group has received at least $20 million from the AI company Anthropic<\/a> and has called for more significant regulation on AI. It also has two affiliated super PACs: Jobs and Democracy PAC backing Democrats and Defending Our Values backing Republicans.<\/p>\n

Brad Carson, the former congressman and Defense Department official who helps lead Public First, told NBC News in a statement that while the public recognizes the importance of the issue, \u201cwe know AI isn\u2019t the first thing on every voter\u2019s mind when they go to the polls.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re worried about cost of living, about corruption, about whether the economy is working for regular people or just for tech billionaires. We believe those concerns are inseparable from AI,\u201d added Carson, who served two terms in the House as a Democrat from Oklahoma. \u201cWe support candidates who understand what\u2019s coming and who will fight for working families as these technologies roll out. AI is an issue right now, and you want leaders in place who\u2019ve done the thinking on what the impact is going to look like.\u201d<\/p>\n

A slice of New York City has emerged as the earliest big battleground<\/a> for the two sides. The Democratic House primary aimed at succeeding retiring Rep. Jerry Nadler is extremely crowded, but the AI groups are focused on one candidate: state legislator Alex Bores, a proponent of AI safety regulation in New York and a former data scientist at Palantir Technologies who says he quit that job over his frustration with the company\u2019s work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. <\/p>\n

Think Big, one of the Leading the Future affiliates, has spent more than $1.5 million attacking Bores, including by hammering him for Palantir\u2019s work for ICE \u2014 even though Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale has supported <\/a>the group and Bores has said he left the company due to his opposition to that work.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s black and white: Alex Bores\u2019 tech company works for ICE,\u201d a narrator says in a new Think Big digital ad in the race. <\/p>\n

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Jobs and Democracy PAC, the Public First affiliate, framed those attacks as cynical and profit-motivated in its own ads.<\/p>\n

\u201cRight-wing billionaires think they can buy this congressional seat, the same ones who bankroll hate, fund lies and prop up ICE raids on our community. Their target: Assemblyman Alex Bores, because he\u2019s the only one who stood up to them before,\u201d says the narrator in a recent Jobs and Democracy PAC ad<\/a>. <\/p>\n

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Think Big is also spending more than a million dollars each in support of two former Illinois members of Congress, Jesse Jackson Jr.<\/a> and Melissa Bean<\/a>, in their comeback bids. Ads in both those races tout Jackson and Bean\u2019s accomplishments in Congress, including voting for the Affordable Care Act \u2014 long before the AI debate entered the halls of Congress. Both Illinois Democrats are scrapping in competitive primaries for open, deep blue, Chicagoland seats where the March primary will serve as the de-facto general election. <\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s Rep. Valerie Foushee\u2019s bid for re-election in North Carolina\u2019s Research Triangle<\/a>, where Durham County Commissioner Nida Allam is attacking the incumbent from her left. Foushee is a member of the Bipartisan House Task Force on Artificial Intelligence, and there\u2019s a major AI-related fight brewing in the district over a push for a new data center<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The incumbent has called for regulations around data centers<\/a> to mitigate any energy or environmental impacts in the past, and she addressed the data center debate in a social media video this week<\/a>, saying that while she doesn\u2019t personally support the new data center, she trusts local officials to \u201cmake the right choice.\u201d Allam has blasted the proposal, calling for a moratorium on data centers and attacking Foushee<\/a> because an AI-linked group is spending on her behalf.<\/p>\n

Indeed, Public First is the only major AI group spending in this district, looking to boost Foushee with more than $1.6 million flooding into the race in its final weeks. <\/p>\n

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But while the data center debate is playing out in local politics, it\u2019s absent from the pro-Foushee ad, which instead frames the incumbent as a progressive fighter on issues like immigration raids and holding Trump accountable. The AI spending has prompted a small counter from Justice Democrats, a progressive group supporting Allam, which dropped a new digital ad<\/a> this week criticizing the incumbent for receiving support from the AI industry.<\/p>\n

The two sides are also boosting preferred candidates in other, less prominent races. <\/p>\n

Lead the Future\u2019s Republican group is spending $500,000 each on generic, biographical ads boosting Republican candidates Laurie Buckhout<\/a> in a North Carolina swing district and Chris Gober<\/a> \u2014 who was a legal adviser to Elon Musk\u2019s political group in 2024 \u2014 in an open, safely Republican Texas district.<\/p>\n

The Public First network is also spending to boost two Republicans who are heavy favorites to win their primary elections in Texas without wading into AI in their ads: Army veteran Alex Mealer and Air Force veteran Carlos De La Cruz.<\/p>\n

The decision to de-emphasize the central issue motivating these groups is not a new strategy. Groups with political aims on Israel, cryptocurrency, the environment and more have long chosen to wage their political battles using other issues more salient to a primary or general electorate, separating the political goals of winning elections from the policy goals they hope the winner will support in office.<\/p>\n

Jesse Hunt, a spokesman with Leading the Future, told NBC News that the group is supporting and assessing candidates \u201cwho we believe are the most pro-innovation candidates when it comes to AI,\u201d adding that it uses both a candidate questionnaire, as well as a review of public statements or relevant records, to help guide them. He added that the debate over AI is \u201cstill in its infancy\u201d and he expects it to evolve over this and future election cycles.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe administration has been clear where they stand on this issue, but other members of Congress are starting to formulate their positions, what they want to see from these companies, how it stands to benefit their constituents, their states, and how it stands to benefit the U.S. economy,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Hunt said the public conversation around AI policy \u201cwill see it mature over time as people become more knowledgeable.\u201d He added: \u201cThrough that process, you\u2019re going to see a greater conversation about the likely ways it will enhance a lot of people\u2019s lives.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/div>\n