Senior Republican officials called Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Tuesday after a new crypto super PAC seeded by his former firm, Cantor Fitzgerald, indicated in a FEC filing that it planned to spend $1.75 million backing Ken Paxton in Texas, Axios has learned.
Activity tagged "crypto lobby"
I’m launching Tech Influence Watch as AI follows crypto into politics
Issue 105 – The new boogeyman
The White House says Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick properly divested from Cantor Fitzgerald by transferring leadership to his sons.
Anyway GOP officials called Lutnick about a Cantor-funded PAC planning to spend $1.75M on Ken Paxton and the PAC reversed course, but that’s probably just how independent companies behave when the former owner gets a phone call.
When will they learn? The party remains far too solicitous of an industry that’s rewarded their fealty with four years of Trump and untold damage to democracy.
The new Fellowship crypto PAC has filed its first fundraising disclosure. It reports a $10 million contribution from Cantor Fitzgerald (previously headed by Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, now controlled by his sons) and $1 million from Anchorage Digital.
The Fellowship PAC launched in September with an announcement that they had $100 million committed. They've recently revealed that the PAC is headed by Tether's head of government affairs Jesse Spiro, and endorsed a slate of Republicans.
Fellowship PAC has made three independent expenditures so far, totalling $1.5M:
- $300k to Clay Fuller, who just won the Republican runoff in GA-14
- $850k to Nate Morris, challenging Andy Barr in the Kentucky Senate Republican primary
- $350k to Pete Ricketts, incumbent Nebraska Senator running for re-election
In September 2025, a new cryptocurrency super PAC launched, claiming to have $100 million committed.
If true, it would mean the crypto super PACs would have nearly half again as much cash to deploy in the midterms. But their EOY filing showed $0, and I was beginning to wonder if it was a bust.
A week ago, Fellowship PAC announced that Jesse Spiro, head of government affairs at stablecoin company Tether, would be chairing the PAC. Now they've endorsed a slate of Republican candidates, and made their first expenditure ($300,000 in the last moments of Clayton Fuller's successful bid for the special election in GA-14).
It seems like this PAC will indeed be entering the playing field, and potentially dramatically increasing the amount of money in play on behalf of the crypto industry if their earlier claims around funds committed are to be believed. There are a few more days until their quarterly filing is due, at which point we should get more insight into how much money this PAC has on hand and where it's coming from.
Their endorsements so far:
- Alan Wilson, South Carolina governor
- Mike Collins, Georgia Senate
- Julia Letlow, Louisiana Senate
- Pete Ricketts, Nebraska Senate (incumbent)
- Nate Morris, Kentucky Senate
- Blake Miguez, Louisiana House District 5
Issue 103 – The President’s Council of Podcasters
90% of crypto's Illinois primary spending failed to achieve its objective
The cryptocurrency industry super PACs dumped $14.2 million into the Illinois primaries. 90% of that – $12.8 million – was wasted, in that it went to opposing Democratic candidates who won their primaries (Stratton in the Senate race, Ford in H-07) or supporting their opponents.
The PACs' only victories in the state were where they contributed money towards outcomes that were already highly likely. They opposed Robert Peters (H-02), who had been polling in third place and ultimately received 12% of the vote. They supported Bean (who was leading the polls in H-08) and incumbent Budzinski (H-13).
Sadly this early spending in Illinois used up less than 6% of what the super PACs have on hand, so buckle up for a looong eight months.








