AI PACs Have Dumped Nearly 1 Million Into an Obscure Senate Race

The reliably Republican South Dakota senate seat has an incumbent on the ballot. But PACs associated with AI labs and investors have already spent more money on the race than actual residents have. Senator Mike Rounds, a Republican from South Dakota, arrives for a vote in Washington, DC, on Thursday, Jan. 29, 2026. Major super PACs associated with AI labs and investors have poured close to $1 million into incumbent Republican Mike Rounds's South Dakota senate race, seeking to shape the outcome of a noncompetitive race amid a critical national debate over AI regulation. Rounds has been the beneficiary this cycle of around $600,000 in spending by outside groups, with the vast majority of that figure coming from the super PAC Defend American Jobs, which receives funding from a super PAC financed by the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz.