Political action committees aligned with the AI industry and groups pushing for stronger safeguards spent millions of dollars seeking to influence Tuesday’s midterm elections. Their results were mixed, and some of the candidates who received the most support lost their races.

On the industry side, American Mission and Building the Future spent a combined $4.8 million backing South Carolina Senate candidate Darline Graham, who lost. American Mission is the Republican spending arm of Leading the Future (LTF), a political group backed by OpenAI president Greg Brockman and venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.

American Mission also spent more than $500,000 each to support Republican House candidates Aaron Flint in Montana and Laurie Buckhout in North Carolina. Both lost. LTF’s Democratic spending arm, Think Big, had more success: its supported candidate, Florida Representative Jared Moskowitz, won reelection.

Groups advocating stronger AI safeguards also saw varied outcomes. Public First, backed by Anthropic, supported several Republican candidates who lost through an affiliated PAC, while its Democratic candidates fared better. The group also contributed $3 million to a PAC supporting California state Senator Scott Wiener, who was leading his race when the source report was published.

Guardrails Alliance, which aims to make accepting money from AI companies a political liability, spent more than $1 million opposing each of two candidates who lost: California Representative Jimmy Gomez and Montana’s Aaron Flint. It also spent $300,000 supporting Angela Gonzales-Torres, who defeated Gomez.

The effect of AI-related spending is difficult to distinguish from the broader Democratic wave in Tuesday’s elections. Elon Musk, who reportedly spent half a billion dollars supporting Republicans, also saw many of his candidates lose. LTF, too, backed some candidates it considered likely to win who were defeated by Democrats.

LTF had said before Election Day that it viewed primaries as a more effective place to spend than general elections. The group argued that primary spending can raise candidates’ profiles and help them develop AI policy agendas. It spent $27.38 million in the primaries, including $8 million opposing New York Assembly member Alex Bores, who lost his congressional bid in June.

When weighing whether to enter a general election race, LTF considers how competitive it is, whether spending could affect the result and whether the money would be better saved for future elections. Guardrails Alliance political director Charlie Blaettler offered another explanation for LTF’s comparatively limited general-election spending: the group may not want its funding to become an issue for candidates.

Blaettler pointed to a Michigan Senate primary in which the pro-Israel lobbying group AIPAC spent close to $30 million supporting Haley Stevens against Abdul El-Sayed. Stevens conceded, and El-Sayed went on to win the Senate seat. Blaettler argued that scrutiny of political spending could become a liability for candidates supported by AI industry groups.

The groups’ broader dispute concerns whether Congress should establish a national AI framework that overrides state laws or leave states free to impose their own safeguards. LTF, which supports a single national framework, plans to continue spending in the 2028 elections. Guardrails Alliance says it will keep opposing candidates backed by the AI industry.

Blaettler said LTF’s advertisements often focus on popular issues associated with individual candidates rather than AI, while Guardrails Alliance’s ads specifically highlight who accepts money from the industry. The group’s stated aim, he said, is to make AI-related political spending toxic.

Sources: TechCrunch.