Fairshake’s Republican-side super PAC, Defend American Jobs, reported $13.2 million of new spending dated 19 October in two Senate races: $6,804,000 opposing Democrat Sherrod Brown and $2,268,000 supporting Republican senator Jon Husted in Ohio, plus $4,085,882 opposing independent Dan Osborn in Nebraska, according to its 24-hour reports to the Federal Election Commission. The other crypto super PAC, Digital Freedom Fund, set up by Gemini founders Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, has now spent in Texas and Iowa as well as Ohio.
Those lines settle a question our 17 October report left open. Coindaro added up every Defend American Jobs line for the Ohio race listed on the FEC site on 24 October: about $55.8 million, of which about $36.1 million supports Husted and about $19.7 million opposes Brown. The lines up to 14 October come to $46.66 million, close to the $46.67 million crypto.news reported from the 15 October filing.
We told the Ohio story, with its ads and polls, in our 17 October report on the crypto PAC money against Sherrod Brown, and do not retell it here. This piece covers what the filings made since then add, ten days before the 3 November vote. Coindaro takes no side in these races; it reports spending and filings.
Crypto super PAC spending by Senate race, FEC lines to 23 October
The sums below are Coindaro’s own additions of the independent expenditure lines shown on fec.gov on 24 October, around 18:00 UTC. Raw 24-hour reports can be amended, so the figures may move by small amounts.
| Race | Committee | Supports | Opposes | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ohio | Defend American Jobs (Fairshake) | Jon Husted (R): about $36.1M | Sherrod Brown (D): about $19.7M | about $55.8M (lines to 20 Oct) |
| Ohio | Digital Freedom Fund (Winklevoss) | Husted: about $2.97M | Brown: about $4.04M | about $7.01M (lines to 22 Oct) |
| Nebraska | Defend American Jobs | none by name | Dan Osborn (I): about $10.8M | about $10.8M (lines to 20 Oct) |
| Iowa | Digital Freedom Fund | Ashley Hinson (R): about $146,000 | Josh Turek (D): about $438,000 | about $585,000 (lines to 23 Oct) |
| Texas | Digital Freedom Fund | Ken Paxton (R): about $41,000 | James Talarico (D): about $114,000 | about $155,000 (lines to 22 Oct) |
Every number here will change. Once an election is less than 20 days away, a super PAC must report each expenditure of $1,000 or more within 24 hours, so new lines arrive almost daily until election day.
Ohio: the $46 million figure now has a split
On 17 October Coindaro could match only $12.9 million of the Ohio total to lines tagged against Brown, and the rest of the split was not public. The FEC pages now show it line by line. In September, Defend American Jobs put about $18.6 million behind Husted and $5.7 million against Brown, the same split Protos reported on 21 October. October added money on both sides: about $17.4 million for Husted and about $14 million against Brown, including $6.8 million against him on 19 October alone.
So the headline figure of our earlier report, “$46 million against Sherrod Brown”, described the whole Ohio race. Most of that money backed Husted rather than attacking Brown. The 19 October lines then pushed the total to about $55.8 million, in line with the “about $56 million” Cointelegraph gave on 22 October.
Cointelegraph described the week’s $9 million in Ohio as spending “supporting Husted over Brown”. The FEC lines are more precise: $2.27 million of it supports Husted and $6.8 million opposes Brown. Protos noted that Defend American Jobs has now spent more in this race than the roughly $40 million it spent for Bernie Moreno in 2024.
The money has to come from somewhere. The committee’s pre-general report, covering 1 January 2025 to 14 October 2026, shows $106 million received as transfers from affiliated committees, $88.3 million of independent expenditures and $18.5 million of cash on hand. The 19 October lines alone used about $13.2 million, more than two-thirds of that cash, unless Fairshake has sent more since.
Brown has called crypto “speculative products run by reckless companies”, in a congressional hearing record that Protos quotes. Husted wrote on X on 15 August that “The Clarity Act would create strong rules for cryptocurrency, protect consumers”. The winner serves the rest of JD Vance’s term, to January 2029.
Beyond Ohio: Nebraska, Texas and Iowa
Nebraska: about $10.8 million against Dan Osborn
Nebraska is now the second-largest crypto PAC race. Crypto.news counted $6,723,909.96 opposing Osborn on the 15 October filing, almost all of it one media buy dated 9 October. The 19 October line of $4,085,882 and a $16,150 line the next day bring Coindaro’s sum to about $10.8 million. The “more than $4 million” against Osborn that Cointelegraph reported on 22 October matches that 19 October line.
The filings name Osborn as the candidate opposed and list no spending for Republican senator Pete Ricketts by name. Ricketts sits on the Senate Banking Committee and voted to advance the Clarity Act, the Daily Caller noted on 13 October.
Other outside money is in the race too. The Senate Leadership Fund said it would spend $8 million through 3 November after $7 million already spent, the paper wrote, citing the Wall Street Journal. Win It Back PAC, linked to the Club for Growth, and other groups had bought $2.3 million of ads, and Osborn’s own campaign about $2.1 million since the primary.
The polls cited by the Daily Caller disagree. Co/efficient, surveying from 28 to 30 September, had Ricketts at 45% and Osborn at 40%; YouGov, from late September to early October, had Osborn at 48% and Ricketts at 47%. Donald Trump won Nebraska by 16 points in 2024, the year Osborn lost to Senator Deb Fischer by 53.3% to 46.7%.
Texas: Digital Freedom Fund’s first lines for Ken Paxton
Texas is the newest front, and the smallest. Digital Freedom Fund’s lines dated 20 October show $77,424 opposing Democrat James Talarico and $4,074 supporting Republican Ken Paxton, the roughly $81,000 of direct mail that Cointelegraph reported on 22 October. Two text-message lines of $36,629 each followed on 22 October, one for each side, taking Texas to about $155,000.
The money arrived after early voting opened on 19 October. Paxton, the state’s attorney general, beat incumbent senator John Cornyn in the May Republican primary. Before that primary he benefited from about $500,000 of ads by Fellowship PAC, a committee backed by Anchorage Digital and Cantor Fitzgerald, placed through Nxum Group, co-founded by Bo Hines, Cointelegraph wrote. Hines, a former White House crypto adviser, is now chief executive of Tether US; the questions about Nxum and Tether are in our report on Senator Blumenthal’s request for records.
Neither campaign answered Cointelegraph. The crypto sums are small next to other Texas money: FEC filings show Elon Musk gave more than $150 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, which sent the same amount to a Texas PAC that has run ads for Paxton, according to the same report.
Iowa: about $585,000 that the press has not covered
Iowa started earlier and has drawn almost no coverage. Digital Freedom Fund’s first Iowa lines are dated 28 September: $348,625 opposing Democrat Josh Turek and $69,725 supporting Republican Ashley Hinson. On 8 October it spent about $76,000 on each side. Small lines followed on 20, 22 and 23 October, the last two of them only $4,195 against Turek and $220 for Hinson.
In Coindaro’s sum that makes about $438,000 against Turek and about $146,000 for Hinson. The FEC data lists her as “Arenholz, Ashley Hinson”. None of the outlets we read for this piece reported the Iowa lines.
Winklevoss super PAC: $33.9 million raised, $4.95 million left
Digital Freedom Fund registered with the FEC on 11 July 2025. The twins had backed Fairshake but objected to its support for Democrats and set up a committee that backs only Republicans, according to InfluenceWatch. They announced a gift of 188.4547 BTC, then worth about $21 million, in August 2025, and Winklevoss Capital Fund LLC accounted for more than $21.29 million of receipts through 30 June 2026.
The committee’s pre-general report, covering activity to 14 October 2026, shows $33.93 million of total receipts, of which $22.49 million came as individual contributions and $11.44 million as “other receipts”. It spent $28.98 million: $22.47 million recorded as operating expenditures and $6.51 million as independent expenditures. Cash on hand was $4.95 million. The report does not say what the operating expenditures paid for, and we did not open each line.
All 24 of its independent expenditure lines go to one vendor, Minute Mail Consulting Group LLC, for direct mail or text messages. Fairshake’s affiliate pays mainly for media placed by Main Street Media Group, with production by Dockside Strategies. Gemini, the exchange the twins run, is a separate company from the PAC; our Gemini exchange review covers it.
Two crypto PAC families, two strategies
Fairshake is the older and larger network. Its main donors are Coinbase, Ripple Labs and the venture firm Andreessen Horowitz, and it spends through Defend American Jobs where it backs Republicans and Protect Progress where it backs Democrats. Fairshake’s disbursements came to $93 million between 1 January 2025 and 31 August 2026, the Daily Caller wrote, citing the FEC. Spokesperson Geoff Vetter told the Associated Press, as quoted by crypto.news, that the network spent $40 million for 29 Democrats and $31 million for 28 Republicans in earlier primaries and special elections, and that its candidates won 53 of those 57 contests.
In the four Senate races above, every dollar from either family supports the Republican candidate or opposes that candidate’s rival. The Democratic arm is spending in smaller races. A KuCoin news flash on 19 October, relaying Cointelegraph, said Protect Progress had spent $362,000 on media for Democrat Aisha Wahab in California’s 14th district, against another Democrat, Melissa Hernandez. That report is unclear about timing, so we cite it only as a sign the Democratic side is still active.
What the money is for: the Clarity Act and the Senate
The reason is a bill. The Clarity Act, the market structure law the industry wants, failed a Senate procedural vote 49 to 50 on 15 September, short of the 60 votes needed, The Defiant reported; no Democrat voted to proceed. The day before, the Associated Press reported that Trump had accepted a stricter ethics provision on his own crypto holdings, after a core group of Democrats and Republican Thom Tillis said the earlier one did not go far enough.
No new vote is scheduled. The lame-duck session after the election is the next window. Our explainer on how the SEC and CFTC write US crypto rules while the Clarity Act is stalled covers what the bill would change.
The arithmetic explains the spending. With 60 votes needed, a single seat can decide whether the bill moves, whichever party holds the majority. Cointelegraph wrote on 22 October that Kalshi and Polymarket contracts favoured Democrats to win both chambers; Coindaro did not re-check those odds at publication.
What the FEC filings do not show
A filing records who was paid, how much, on what date, and which candidate was supported or opposed. It says nothing about strategy or effect. Super PACs may not coordinate with campaigns, and the payee names describe vendors, not plans.
No filing shows whether the money changes votes. Signal Ohio reported in September that the Defend American Jobs ads against Brown dealt with taxes and Social Security, not crypto. The content of the Texas and Iowa mailers is not public in the sources we read.
Some gaps remain open. We do not know whether Fairshake has moved new money to Defend American Jobs since 14 October, or what Digital Freedom Fund’s $22.47 million of operating expenditures bought.
Why readers in Europe should watch the US vote
No European donor appears in these filings. The link is indirect: Fairshake’s funders, Coinbase and Ripple among them, run products that many European users hold, and the US rules for their business depend on the Congress elected on 3 November.
The EU settled the equivalent question with MiCA, already in force; our MiCA guide explains what it covers. Apex Group’s chief executive argued in a CoinDesk interview on 24 October that the Clarity Act’s failure gives Asia and the Middle East a competitive edge. That is his opinion, not a measured effect.
Dates to watch before and after 3 November
Ohio, Nebraska, Texas and Iowa all vote on 3 November. Until then each new expenditure of $1,000 or more reaches the FEC within 24 hours. The post-general reports, due in early December, will give each committee’s final spending per race. The lame-duck session will then show whether the Clarity Act gets a second Senate vote this year.
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