Billions flowed into the election campaign in the US general election, especially from rich Republican supporters like Elon Musk. But in many places the voters refused to buy their votes.
Since the beginning of US President Donald Trump's second term in office, he has been courted by billionaires from the tech industry.
Washington. “It wasn’t just a blue wave, it was an American tsunami,” said Democratic U.S. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries after his party’s stunning election victory. The tsunami also disrupted a Republican strategy: They wanted to defend their power in Washington with the help of huge donations from billionaires and corporations.
In many places, it was not big money that prevailed, but rather candidates who relied on small donors, volunteers and the direct mobilization of their supporters. What's more: the millions donated to their opponents could even have helped them mobilize their own camp.
This US election campaign was more expensive than any before. According to the advertising company AdImpact, around 12 billion dollars (currently around 10.7 billion euros) were spent on political advertising - even more than in the 2024 presidential election. According to a study by the Brennan Center for Justice think tank, the 40 largest donors alone contributed around 2.4 billion dollars by mid-October. That was around 50 percent more than the comparative figure for the entire 2022 election campaign. The Republicans were the clear beneficiaries: they received more than three times as much money from major donors exclusively affiliated with one party than the Democrats.
David versus Goliath in Texas
How little money alone determines an election victory was particularly evident in Texas. There, Republican Governor Greg Abbott lost his office to Democrat Gina Hinojosa - even though he had spent almost eight times as much money on his election campaign.
Instead, Hinojosa relied more on social media, influencers and the direct mobilization of her supporters. Her campaign was funded largely by small donations - an average of around $53. Although she also received support from wealthy donors, this was no match for Abbott's financial advantage.
Something similar happened in the Senate election in Texas. Democrat James Talarico won against Republican Ken Paxton, who had a massive network of well-funded supporters behind him. Tech billionaire Elon Musk alone transferred $168 million to a Republican campaign fund, much of which was passed on to a committee supporting Paxton.
Talarico made the influence of the super-rich himself a campaign issue. He compared the fight against billionaires and the political establishment to the biblical story of David versus Goliath. After his victory, he declared: “Tonight we defeated Goliath.”
When the millions become an election campaign issue
The downside of large campaign spending was also clear in Michigan. There, the left-wing Democrat Abdul El-Sayed initially prevailed in the party's internal primary against Congresswoman Haley Stevens. According to the Washington Post, almost nine times as much money was spent on election advertising for Stevens as for El-Sayed, including enormous sums from a pro-Israel lobbying organization.
El-Sayed turned this into an argument against his competitor: He accused the political establishment of making itself dependent on wealthy interest groups. His campaign relied on a movement of thousands of volunteers. The strategy was reminiscent of the surprise success of the left-wing democrat Zohran Mamdani in the 2025 New York mayoral election. He also relied on a popular address and an army of volunteers in order to triumph against better-funded candidates.
Not even Elon Musk's millions are enough
Nobody sunk as much money in the Republican defeat as Musk. According to the Washington Post, the richest person in the world put around $446 million of his own wealth into the 2026 election campaign - more than any other known individual donor in modern US history. His money went into supporting Republican candidates in Texas, Ohio and Maine, among other things. They lost important races.
As early as April 2025, he had tried to influence a judicial election in the state of Wisconsin in favor of a conservative candidate with enormous sums of money. According to the Brennan Center, it was the most expensive judicial election in US history. A campaign organization funded by Musk even offered people money to sign a petition against “activist judges.” Three signatories received checks for one million dollars each, some handed over personally by Musk. But it didn't help: his preferred candidate lost clearly to a more left-wing judge.
According to the Brennan Center, companies and billionaires from the technology industry in particular are now investing increasingly large amounts of money in politics. The artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency industries in particular are trying to influence the future regulation of their businesses by supporting candidates.
But the expansion of AI data centers in particular has recently met with resistance in many places due to concerns about rising electricity prices, high water consumption and environmental pollution. Mamdani said after the election: "Americans are tired of politicians bought by the richest people in the country telling them their needs are unrealistic."
