Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, a daily newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.
In today’s edition, Ben Kamisar digs into how AI super PACs are getting involved in the midterms with tens of millions of dollars at their disposal. Plus, Kristen Welker sets up the stakes for both parties in next week’s Texas Senate primary.
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— Adam Wollner
Ads funded by the AI industry are flooding the 2026 election. They’re about everything except AI.
By Ben Kamisar
Super PACs backed by the AI industry are already pouring money into the 2026 midterms elections. There’s just one thing missing from their ads so far: any reference to AI.
Groups that are seeking to shape how AI models and companies are regulated nationwide are leaning into other hot-button issues instead of the actual policy reason they are wading into both parties’ primaries this year.
While the tactic is also used by groups in other areas, the early AI-backed spending on ads about President Donald Trump, immigration, health care and more is especially notable because of the dramatic scale of change AI titans expect their product to bring to American society.
The players: So far, two rival umbrella organizations have dominated the AI spending in congressional races. Leading the Future — 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 — is one major super PAC pushing a national framework for AI and criticizing the prospect of different state regulations governing the industry.
Leading the Future had $39 million banked away 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.
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 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.
The ads: The crowded Democratic primary to replace retiring Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., has emerged as an early battleground. The main target of AI groups has been state Rep. Alex Bores, a proponent of AI safety regulation and a former data scientist at Palantir Technologies, who says he quit that job over his frustration with the company’s work with Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
But that hasn’t stopped Think Big from spending more than $1.5 million attacking Bores, including by hammering him for Palantir’s work for ICE — even though Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale has supported the group.
“It’s black and white: Alex Bores’ tech company works for ICE,” a narrator says in a new Think Big digital ad in the race.
Jobs and Democracy PAC framed those attacks as cynical and profit-motivated in its own ads.
“Right-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’s the only one who stood up to them before,” says the narrator in one recent ad.
Read more from Ben →
🤖 Related: Trump tells government to stop using Anthropic’s AI systems, by Jared Perlo and Kevin Collier
What the Texas primaries will reveal about the state of both parties
Analysis by Kristen Welker
The start of midterm season is finally here, with primaries in Texas, North Carolina and Arkansas kicking things off next week.
It’s no secret that the biggest prize on Tuesday’s ballot is the pivotal Texas Senate race, where competitive primaries on both sides will shed light on what primary voters want from their nominees, and where Texas might rank on the Senate battlefield this fall.
For Republicans, Sen. John Cornyn is fighting for his political life as he and his allies have spent millions to brand him as a MAGA warrior. Meanwhile, his opponents are highlighting his post-2020 criticism of President Donald Trump’s electability and prod at his relationship with the party’s base. It’s not just a referendum on Cornyn, but on what it means to be accepted by Republican voters in a party fully remade in Trump’s image — a dynamic we’re going to see play out in dozens of key races this spring and summer.
And on the Democratic side, a lack of deep differences on the issues has revealed a fascinating debate on tactics. Democratic voters will decide whether Rep. Jasmine Crockett’s push to energize the party’s base and bring out new voters or state Rep. James Talarico’s bid to appeal to independents and Republicans while still embracing the party’s values gives them a better chance to win their first Senate race in Texas in decades. Former Vice President Kamala Harris waded into the contest today, endorsing Crockett.
That tactical divide was on display when both candidates joined “Meet the Press NOW” a few months back. Talarico, speaking days after the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, lamented “polarized politics” trying to get Americans to “forget the ties that bind us together.”
“Those ties are at the center of this American experiment of ours. And if we allow those ties to loosen and unravel, then we won’t have an American experiment to continue,” he added.
A few months later, in an interview with my colleague Gabe Gutierrez, Crockett pushed back at questions about her electability with general election voters — framing her high profile as a strength in a “terrible environment for the Republicans.”
“We historically start with a candidate who has a great resume but unfortunately doesn’t have, necessarily, the name ID,” she said of past statewide candidates in Texas.
“Walking into this race, we know that our first dollars, they go to actually turning people out and more so to persuasion and expansion. It’s hard to expand if the base itself still is trying to get to know who you are.”
Join me this Sunday on “Meet the Press,” where I’ll interview Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Rep. Ro Khanna, D-Calif., and preview more of what’s to come in the March 3 primaries with Steve Kornacki. And make sure to tune in Tuesday night for our special primary night coverage on NBC News NOW.
🗳️Related: Trump’s takeover of the GOP upends Texas Senate race, by Bridget Bowman
🗞️ Today’s other top stories
- 🔵 Party foul: Union leaders in recent days have urged Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to end their support for Gov. Janet Mills’ Maine Senate campaign, pointing to what they see as her weaker record with labor. Read more →
- 🎤 Clinton deposition: Former President Bill Clinton told members of the Republican-led House Oversight Committee investigating his ties to Jeffrey Epstein that he “saw nothing” and “did nothing wrong.” He also ripped the panel for making his wife sit for a deposition. Read more →
- ⚖️ In the courts: The Justice Department secured a new indictment charging 30 more people in connection with an anti-ICE protest at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota, in January. Read more →
- 🪪 In the states: Two transgender people in Kansas have filed a lawsuit to block a new state law that invalidated hundreds of residents’ driver’s licenses by requiring they reflect the holders’ biological sex rather than their gender identities. Read more →
- ➡️ Laser tag: The U.S. government said it would do more to improve communication among agencies, after the military reportedly used a laser to shoot down a Customs and Border Protection drone in Texas. Read more →
- 🏒 Off the rink: U.S. hockey player Brady Tkachuk slammed an AI-generated video shared by the House House that made it look like he was disparaging Canadians as “clearly fake.” Read more →
- 🎶 No surprises: Radiohead is demanding that the Trump administration take down a promotional video for ICE that uses one of their songs. Read more →
That’s all From the Politics Desk for now. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner.
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