Sign up here to receive Bellingcat’s biggest investigations by email as soon as they are published. Become a member and support our work here.

An online ad for Ben McAdams, the Democratic candidate for Congress in Utah, emphasised that he could be trusted because he “fought back against MAGA”.

In Texas, another ad promoted Republican candidate Chris Gober, calling him a “MAGA warrior”.

What’s interesting is that both ads were ultimately paid for with money from the same organisation – Leading the Future (LTF), a Super PAC which opposes regulations that “constrain” innovation in AI. The network has received US$125 million in funding in total from OpenAI president Greg Brockman, his wife Anna Brockman, tech-focused venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and a16z’s founders, Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings show. 

Directly opposing LTF is Public First Action (PFA), which calls for AI safety regulations and guardrails. PFA has received $40 million in funding from AI company Anthropic. 

Like the ads run by organisations funded by LTF, the Super PACs funded by PFA also ran ads that appeared supportive or critical of Trump depending on the voters they were targeting. 

None of these ads mentions AI.

As the US 2026 midterm elections approach on Nov. 3, Super PAC spending on political advertising has reportedly soared to record highs, surpassing US$11 billion last week and exceeding the amount spent on any other election cycle to date. 

Super PACs are a particular type of political action committee (PAC) that may receive unlimited contributions from individuals, corporations, labour unions and other PACs for the purpose of financing independent expenditures and other independent political activity.

In this year’s elections, LTF’s and PFA’s Super PACs, funded by the AI industry heavyweights, have played an outsized role in supporting or opposing candidates through advertising. But as polls show distrust of AI crosses party lines, the advertisements that Silicon Valley’s leaders are paying millions of dollars to try to sway the results in their chosen candidates’ favour often do not mention AI at all. 

While LTF is a registered Super PAC itself, FEC filings show it mainly disburses money to other Super PACs in its network which run political ads. 

Of about $52 million that LTF has disbursed to date, $20 million went to Think Big, which targets the Democratic voter base, and another $20 million went to American Mission, which focuses on Republicans. 

PFA, meanwhile, is registered as a “social welfare”, or 501(c)(4), organisation. This type of non-profit is not required to disclose its donors or disbursements. However, PFA contributes funds to three Super PACs: the bipartisan Public First PAC, Jobs and Democracy for Democratic candidates and Defending Our Values for Republicans. FEC filings for these Super PACs show Public First PAC received $1 million, Jobs and Democracy received $15.4 million and Defending Our Values received $7.9 million from PFA. Public First PAC’s FEC filings also show that $4 million of its $4.4 million in disbursements disclosed so far went to Jobs and Democracy, while another $300,000 went to Defending Our Values. 

Super PACs are allowed to accept unlimited contributions from other political committees, and other similar networks of Super PACs have been observed in the current election cycle, such as cryptocurrency-linked Fairshake and its affiliated Super PACs.

Bellingcat analysed data on more than 300 online video ad campaigns paid for by Think Big, American Mission, Jobs and Democracy and Defending Our Values from Google’s Ad Transparency Center. These ad campaigns, many of which used the same videos in slightly different formats or across different platforms, supported or opposed 40 candidates. 

Only ads supporting or opposing two candidates mentioned AI, and none mentioned data centres, a top issue this election cycle. A New York Times analysis of 95 video ads paid for by the same four Super PACs, using data gathered by media tracking firm AdImpact, had similar findings. FEC rules state that Super PACs can spend money to support or oppose a candidate, but cannot coordinate with the candidate or their campaign on this. There is no evidence that any of the candidates or campaigns for which the Super PACs ran ads have coordinated with them.

Michael Beckel, Director of Money in Politics Reform at cross-partisan political reform group Issue One, told Bellingcat that voters are at a disadvantage when special interests fund Super PACs running ads that don’t mention the priority issues of those underwriting them. 

“Special interests seem keen on moving voters with messaging around hot-button issues, all while advancing a specific policy agenda that viewers of ads are kept in the dark about,” he said. The result of this, Beckel added, was that “the industry gains a stronger hand in Washington, while voters get little chance to judge the agenda their votes could help advance”. 

A representative for PFA stated: “We endorse officials who support regulating AI. The aligned PACs run ads on the issues that matter most immediately to voters in each race, and for most electorates right now that means the economy, affordability, public safety, and other issues that they are facing on a daily basis.” 

Jobs and Democracy, Defending Our Values, LTF, Think Big and American Mission did not respond to questions about their political advertising as of publication. 

A recent survey by think tank Data for Action and non-profit Guardrails Action found that about three-quarters of likely voters would be less inclined to vote for a candidate if they found out they had accepted a donation from an AI Super PAC. 

The ads distributed by the AI-backed Super PACs supporting or opposing 29 candidates mentioned economic issues such as taxes, the cost of living, consumer rights and local jobs or small businesses. Another 16 mentioned immigration or law enforcement and 17 mentioned US President Donald Trump or his “Make America Great Again” (MAGA) movement. 

Like the ads mentioning Trump, those on immigration were sharply divided in messaging depending on whether they were targeting Democratic or Republican voters, even when they were paid for by the AI Super PACs in the same network. 

LTF’s Think Big sponsored an ad for Democratic candidate Jeremy Moss in Michigan that talks about how he stood up to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), while American Mission’s ad for Republican Clay Fuller in Georgia mentions how he is focused on securing the southern border. 

We found similar messaging in ads mentioning immigration that were paid for by Super PACs in PFA’s network. Defending Our Values ran an ad in support of Republican John Cowan in Georgia emphasising that he will combat illegal immigration, whereas Jobs and Democracy’s ad for Democrat Valerie Foushee in North Carolina said she was “leading the fight to hold ICE accountable”.

For the ads that did mention AI, almost all were in support of Alex Bores’ primary in New York. PFA’s Jobs and Democracy PAC ran 152 ads supporting Bores’ candidacy, at least some of which mentioned that he was in favour of safeguards on AI and holding Big Tech accountable. 

LTF’s Think Big, on the other hand, ran 22 ads opposing Bores’ candidacy. While they did not mention his stance on AI, many of Think Big’s ads focused on him receiving funding from Anthropic, “dark money Super PACs” and his former employer Palantir, the software giant whose technology, including a new AI system, is used in ICE’s immigration enforcement operations. 

Jobs and Democracy’s advertiser page also showed two ads for Josh Gottheimer in New Jersey that focused on the threats of AI scams and AI-generated media, urging voters to call Gottheimer to tell him to “stand strong for AI safeguards”. 

Major donors to LTF that Bellingcat reached out to – Greg Brockman, a16z, a16z founders Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz, and OpenAI – did not respond to requests for comment on their funding to the Super PACs as of publication. We could not find any publicly available contact information for Anna Brockman, but we also asked about her contributions to LTF in questions to her husband.

Related articles by Bellingcat

Guides

What Meta’s Ad Library Shows About Harris and Trump’s Campaigns on Facebook and Instagram

OpenAI did not respond to questions about the Brockmans’ contributions to LTF as of publication. However, the company published a statement on the topic in June, which said “OpenAI does not direct the activities of LTF, or have visibility into their operations” and that “any engagement with that organisation has been in a personal capacity, not on behalf of the company”. 

PFA’s main public donor, Anthropic, did not respond to Bellingcat’s queries about its funding for PFA and PFA’s political advertising as of publication. It said in a statement on its website in July that its donations to PFA were “to help promote policies that will maintain meaningful safeguards, sustain America’s AI leadership, and demand transparency from the companies building the most powerful AI models”.

Unknown Vendors

Federal campaign finance laws require federal political committees to file periodic campaign finance reports disclosing their receipts and disbursements. 

Our analysis of FEC filings for LTF and the Super PACs in its network revealed that they were channelling more than $36.4 million in total towards four companies that were newly set up, with no apparent online presence outside of these filings. 

A complaint to the FEC by the non-profit Campaign Legal Center (CLC) in May cited American Mission and Think Big’s payments to Summit Ridge and Lantern Productions, alleging that the Super PACs had “unlawfully evaded federal reporting requirements by funnelling their payments for goods and services through shell companies set up to conceal how the super PACs are actually spending their money”. The FEC has not yet ruled on the complaint. LTF, American and Think Big did not respond to Bellingcat’s queries about the complaint as of publication.

FEC filings show that LTF paid a company called Prusik Partners LLC more than $966,000 for operational expenditures for a range of services including communications and strategy consulting, as well as legal fees. 

The network’s Democrat-focused Super PAC, Think Big, paid a company called Lantern Production Consultants LLC more than $20 million, based on filings for disbursements from Aug. 20, 2025 to Oct. 14, 2026. 

Support Bellingcat

Your donations directly contribute to our ability to publish groundbreaking investigations and uncover wrongdoing around the world.

Donate

The payments included $3.17 million for operational expenditures for a range of services such as media consulting and research, and another $17 million for independent expenditures. The FEC defines an independent expenditure as one that pays for “a communication that expressly advocates for the election or defeat of a clearly identified candidate”. The highest independent expenditures paid to Lantern ($8 million) were to oppose Bores’ candidacy, the filings show.

Think Big also declared in its filings that it had paid a company called Blue Horizon Compliance Consultants LLC almost $55,700 for “compliance consulting”. 

Republican-focused American Mission, on the other hand, paid a company called Summit Ridge Media LLC more than $13 million, based on filings for disbursements from Aug. 20, 2025 to Oct. 14, 2026. 

This included $2.2 million for operating expenditures such as polling and website services, and $10.9 million in independent expenditures, with the highest amount (about $960,400) going towards communications in support of James Morris Kingston, the Republican candidate for the House of Representatives in Georgia.

Bellingcat found that all four of these LLCs listed mailing offices and office supply goods stores in Nevada as their mailing addresses. We could not find records of them doing business with any entity outside of the LTF network – in fact, they appeared to have no online presence aside from their names appearing in the filings and business registrations. 

Despite their addresses being listed in Nevada, none of the companies could be found in the state’s public business registry. Instead, Bellingcat found registrations for Prusik, Lantern Production and Summit Ridge across the country – in Delaware. 

While Delaware is the second-smallest state in the US, more than half of all Fortune 500 companies are incorporated there according to the Delaware Secretary of State. The state’s business-friendly laws mean companies can reportedly incorporate in minutes, and are only required to name of a representative – who can be a paid agent unrelated to the business – in public registration documents, not the beneficial owners.

Articles of incorporation from the Delaware Secretary of State showed that Prusik was registered on July 22, 2025, while Lantern Production and Summit Ridge were both registered on Oct. 30, 2025. We also found a Delaware registration for a company called “Blue Horizon Compliance Group LLC”, registered on Oct. 30, 2025. While the name differs slightly from the Blue Horizon Compliance Consultants LLC that Think Big declared payments for, the registration was signed by the same agent listed in the documents for Lantern Production and Summit Ridge. 

The filings show that all of these companies – including Blue Horizon Compliance Group, if this was indeed the same entity referred to in Think Big’s filings – began receiving payments from the Super PACs within two to three months of their business registrations.

Saurav Ghosh, CLC’s Director of Federal Campaign Finance Reform, told Bellingcat that the group filed the complaint because “when groups funded by big corporate special interests evade transparency laws, voters lose”. 

“Federal reporting requirements help ensure transparency in our elections and protect voters’ legal right to know where the money is going,” Ghosh said. “Secret spending schemes like this make it virtually impossible to ensure that our elected officials are staying accountable to voters instead of wealthy special interests.”

We were unable to reach out to the LLCs as none of them had phone numbers or email addresses listed online. LTF, Think Big, and American Mission did not respond to questions about the LLCs, including whether “Blue Horizon Compliance Consultants LLC” listed in Think Big’s filings was the same company as Delaware-registered “Blue Horizon Compliance Group LLC”. However, a WIRED story on these same LLCs quoted a spokesperson from LTF as saying that the complaint was “a desperate ploy for attention from Public First, Anthropic, and the groups aligned with their outside organisations”. WIRED also quoted a Public First spokesperson denying that the group had anything to do with the complaint.  

Beckel suggested that stricter transparency measures relating to Super PAC spending would help inform and empower voters. For instance, Congress could pass legislation to require ads to include the names of the top donors, he said, adding that similar rules had been passed with cross-partisan support in places like Alaska and Arizona. 

“Congress would be doing voters a huge service by passing more robust transparency requirements for political ads. Voters deserve to know who is behind the ads they’re seeing,” Beckel said. 

This research was funded by the Tarbell Center for AI Journalism. 

Data visualisations by Galen Reich. Melissa Zhu contributed research to this piece.

Bellingcat is a non-profit and the ability to carry out our work is dependent on the kind support of individual donors. If you would like to support our work, you can do so here. You can also subscribe to our Newsletter and follow us on Bluesky here, Instagram here, Reddit here and YouTube here.

The post Inside the Secretive, Contradictory World of Campaign Ads Funded by AI Super PACs appeared first on bellingcat.