Crypto-focused super PACs spent more than $176 million across 100+ races in the 2026 US midterms.
However, their biggest campaign ended in defeat after Democrat Sherrod Brown defeated Republican Jon Husted to win Ohio’s Senate contest despite a $64 million effort to stop him.
Brown Beats Husted Despite $64M Crypto Campaign
According to NBC figures, Brown got 2.24 million votes, making up about 49.7% of the total cast, with Husted receiving 2.06 million, or 45.5%, with 97.3% of the vote counted.
Heading into this particular showdown, crypto groups had spent more than $64 million trying to prevent that exact outcome, with Fairshake, the industry’s flagship super PAC, accounting for $56.5 million of the spending, and Digital Freedom Fund, supported by the Winklevoss twins who co-founded the Gemini exchange, contributing another $7.5 million.
Brown frequently criticized the crypto sector during his time as chair of the Senate Banking Committee, but during the campaign, he seemed to have somewhat softened his stance, even telling the New York Times that crypto “has a part, a role, in our economy.” Still, he pledged to take on what he called the “crypto/data center crowd.”
Recall that in 2024, Brown, who had served for three terms as Ohio senator, lost to Republican Bernie Moreno, garnering 2.59 million (46.4%) votes to Moreno’s 2.8 million (50.2%). That race was the biggest single target of crypto money at the time and drew more ad spending than any Senate contest in history, with the digital asset industry backing the Republican candidate with a $40 million war chest.
The latest spending didn’t produce the same outcome, and researcher Molly White, who has been tracking which crypto and AI players have been supporting with their money, described it as a “HUGE loss for crypto super PACs.”
Democrats Take Congress
There were also losses for other industry-backed candidates in Texas, Alabama, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Michigan. But there was a reprieve in Colorado’s 8th District, where Democrat Manny Rutinel, who had gotten support from groups including Ripple co-founder Chris Larsen’s You Can Push Back PAC, beat incumbent Gabe Evans by a sizable margin.
Crypto groups also won in Nebraska, where Republican Pete Ricketts defeated independent Dan Osborn. Fairshake, funded mainly by Coinbase, venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz, and Ripple, had spent about $14.1 million in the race to back Ricketts, who has been a supporter of industry-friendly crypto legislation from his perch on the Senate Banking Committee.
That said, the broader political picture has become less favorable to the industry, with Democrats securing control of the House and Senate. According to estimates at the time of writing, the party is set to capture 258 seats in the House and at least 54 in the Senate, having flipped 29 and 7 seats in the respective chambers.
Before the results, CryptosRus had warned that a victory for the Dems could further delay the CLARITY Act, which they had blocked in September.
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