Elon Musk’s America PAC Is Quietly Funding November’s Most Consequential Elections

Elon Musk’s America PAC is focusing its war chest on the most consequential Senate races this midterm cycle—and doing so by financing attack ads on Democrats, as voters nationwide sour on the Trump administration’s agenda.

埃隆·马斯克的“美国政治行动委员会”（America PAC）正将其资金集中在本次中期选举中最关键的参议院竞选上，并通过资助针对民主党人的攻击性广告来达成目的，因为全国选民对特朗普政府的议程正日益感到不满。

The trend of political parties and outside groups focusing on trashing their opponents is not a new phenomenon. But America PAC’s approach has been unusual: for every dollar it has spent supporting GOP Senate candidates, it has spent almost three dollars attacking Democrats.

政党和外部团体专注于抹黑对手的趋势并非新现象。但“美国政治行动委员会”的做法却很不寻常：它每花一美元支持共和党参议院候选人，就会花近三美元去攻击民主党人。

To monitor America PAC’s spending on digital ads and mailers this cycle, our ace team at WIRED has created a live tracker that updates daily and highlights where Musk’s political contributions are heading as we enter the waning years of Trump’s second term.

为了监测“美国政治行动委员会”在本选举周期的数字广告和邮寄广告支出，我们在《连线》（WIRED）的王牌团队创建了一个每日更新的实时追踪器，重点展示随着特朗普第二任期进入尾声，马斯克的政治捐款流向何处。

The political stakes are especially high for Republicans this midterms cycle because of the possibility of Democrats taking the majority in the US Senate, should the party flip four battleground races and retain three of the Senate seats it currently holds.

对于共和党人来说，本次中期选举的政治利害关系尤为重大，因为如果民主党能翻转四个战场选区并保住目前持有的三个参议院席位，他们就有可能在参议院获得多数席位。

For Musk, the implications of a Democratic-controlled Senate would also be far-reaching, as he personally could become the target of congressional investigations, while his companies might be affected by bills related to tech and AI regulation.

对马斯克而言，民主党控制参议院的影响也将是深远的，因为他个人可能会成为国会调查的目标，而他的公司也可能受到与科技和人工智能监管相关法案的影响。

Texas Senate Race: For the critical Texas Senate race, America PAC has poured more than $9.4 million into ads opposing Democratic candidate James Talarico and roughly $1.8 million into ads backing Republican candidate and state attorney general Ken Paxton.

得克萨斯州参议院竞选：在关键的得克萨斯州参议院竞选中，“美国政治行动委员会”已投入超过940万美元用于反对民主党候选人詹姆斯·塔拉里科（James Talarico）的广告，并投入约180万美元用于支持共和党候选人、州总检察长肯·帕克斯顿（Ken Paxton）的广告。

The lopsided spending here is perhaps the least surprising of all of the close Senate contests. Paxton comes with so much personal baggage—from facing impeachment charges that were eventually dropped to having his wife (who has since endorsed him with an ad that doesn’t mention him by name) file for divorce on “biblical grounds”—that trying to boost him with ads highlighting his background is tough.

这里的支出失衡或许是所有胶着的参议院竞选中最不令人意外的。帕克斯顿背负着太多的个人包袱——从面临最终被撤销的弹劾指控，到他的妻子（后来通过一则未提及他名字的广告对他表示了支持）以“圣经理由”提出离婚——以至于试图通过强调他背景的广告来提升他的形象非常困难。

Republicans in Texas also cannot realistically do positive ads of President Donald Trump and Paxton together, since both men have terrible approval ratings.

得克萨斯州的共和党人实际上也无法制作唐纳德·特朗普总统与帕克斯顿共同出现的正面广告，因为两人的支持率都很糟糕。

The largest single expenditures by America PAC have been two $1.3 million digital media buys opposing Talarico. America PAC has not put any money into television ads, which is being handled by other groups, like MAGA Inc., the Trump-affiliated super PAC.

“美国政治行动委员会”单笔最大的支出是两笔各130万美元的数字媒体购买，用于反对塔拉里科。该委员会没有在电视广告上投入任何资金，这部分工作由其他团体负责，例如与特朗普有关联的超级政治行动委员会“MAGA Inc.”。

Meanwhile, the Senate Republican Conference–affiliated Texas PAC has so far booked the lion’s share of television ads. Punchbowl News reported last month that Texas PAC has booked around $120 million and was looking to buy $100 million in ad slots before November 3.

与此同时，隶属于参议院共和党会议的“得克萨斯政治行动委员会”目前已预订了大部分电视广告。Punchbowl News上个月报道称，该委员会已预订了约1.2亿美元的广告位，并计划在11月3日前再购买1亿美元的广告位。

Ohio Senate Race: In Ohio’s Senate race, America PAC has spent $3.3 million against Democrat Sherrod Brown compared to $1.6 million supporting Republican candidate Jon Husted.

俄亥俄州参议院竞选：在俄亥俄州的参议院竞选中，“美国政治行动委员会”花费了330万美元反对民主党人谢罗德·布朗（Sherrod Brown），而支持共和党候选人乔恩·哈斯特德（Jon Husted）的支出为160万美元。

Husted has been struggling to distance himself from supporting data centers at a time when voters in the state have become fed up with rising costs associated with the projects. Husted has been tagged as “the face of data centers” because of a planned Nvidia data center project in Ohio that will be leased by OpenAI, and for his past support for data centers when he served in the state government.

在俄亥俄州选民对与数据中心项目相关的成本上升感到厌倦之际，哈斯特德一直难以撇清自己对数据中心的支持。由于俄亥俄州一个计划中的英伟达数据中心项目（将由OpenAI租赁）以及他过去在州政府任职时对数据中心的支持，哈斯特德被贴上了“数据中心代言人”的标签。

The effort by Brown to cast Husted as the champion of data centers has in fact been so effective that a memo by the Senate Republicans’ campaign arm in August said it was tying an anchor around the neck of Husted’s public polling.

布朗试图将哈斯特德塑造成数据中心拥护者的努力实际上非常有效，以至于参议院共和党竞选部门在8月份的一份备忘录中称，这正成为拖累哈斯特德民调的沉重负担。

At a rally this week in Ohio, despite the cratering public support for data centers, Trump could not help himself and declared to the crowd: “We want them.” Husted’s campaign quickly replied that it should be a “local decision.”

在本周俄亥俄州的一次集会上，尽管公众对数据中心的支持率暴跌，特朗普还是忍不住向人群宣布：“我们需要它们。”哈斯特德的竞选团队迅速回应称，这应该是一个“地方决定”。

Iowa Senate Race: In Iowa, America PAC has spent $1.5 million hitting Democratic candidate Josh Turek, while only spending roughly $100,000 supporting the Republican candidate Ashley Hinson—the biggest disparity, according to the WIRED tracker.

艾奥瓦州参议院竞选：在艾奥瓦州，“美国政治行动委员会”花费了150万美元攻击民主党候选人乔什·图雷克（Josh Turek），而支持共和党候选人阿什利·辛森（Ashley Hinson）的支出仅约10万美元——根据《连线》的追踪器显示，这是差距最大的一场竞选。

To put that another way: To date, Musk’s political operation has spent a staggering 14 times more attacking Turek than supporting Hinson.

换句话说：迄今为止，马斯克的政治行动在攻击图雷克上花费的资金是支持辛森的14倍，数额惊人。

This could be because Hinson has taken great pains to distance herself from Trump’s agenda. She recently called on Trump to ban diesel exports and end the Iran war (after previously voting six times against the House resolution to end the conflict), after Turek called for both of those measures.

这可能是因为辛森费尽心思与特朗普的议程保持距离。在图雷克呼吁禁止柴油出口并结束伊朗战争后，她最近也呼吁特朗普采取同样的措施（尽管她此前曾六次投票反对众议院结束该冲突的决议）。

To illustrate the upside-down nature of this race, Hinson recently launched attack ads against Turek, accusing him without evidence of having “received tens of millions in support from men in the Epstein files,” a remarkable situation given that Trump has sought to tamp down any mention of the files because of the negative blowback on him personally.

为了说明这场竞选的荒谬性，辛森最近发起了针对图雷克的攻击性广告，在没有证据的情况下指控他“从爱泼斯坦文件中的人物那里获得了数千万美元的支持”。考虑到特朗普因担心个人负面影响而一直试图压制任何关于这些文件的提及，这实在是一个引人注目的情况。

Once again, pro-Republican ads are likely not helpful when the candidate is trying to run a race apart from Trump and is barely ahead in the polls in what should be a safe Republican seat. In the most recent New York Times/Siena poll, Hinson was just one single, solitary point ahead of Turek.

再一次，当候选人试图脱离特朗普进行竞选，且在一个本应是共和党稳赢的席位上民调仅微弱领先时，支持共和党的广告很可能无济于事。在最近的《纽约时报》/锡耶纳学院民调中，辛森仅领先图雷克一个百分点。

This is an edition of Hugo Lowell’s Inner Loop newsletter. Read previous newsletters here.

这是雨果·洛厄尔（Hugo Lowell）的“内环”（Inner Loop）通讯的一期。点击此处阅读往期通讯。