American billionaire Elon Musk leads donors in record $11.9 billion US midterms

American billionaire Elon Musk enters Tuesday's U.S. midterm elections as the biggest political donor of the cycle, having given $445.6 million to Republican causes in races that are on course to be the most expensive midterms in history.

Spending on federal races this cycle is projected to reach $11.9 billion, a record for a midterm and $1.7 billion more than in 2022 after adjusting for inflation, campaign finance research group OpenSecrets said in an analysis released on Oct. 30. "When all the reporting is in, we will have another record midterm election," the group said. About $1.5 billion of the total has come from groups that do not disclose their donors.

Musk's $445.6 million, based on Federal Election Commission filings through Oct. 14, is the largest amount any individual has given in a single election cycle in modern U.S. history. Counting money from companies he controls, the Brennan Center for Justice puts his spending at about $483 million.

Nearly twice Soros's lifetime giving

Musk has given $427.5 million to federal political committees in the 17 months since May 2025, when he said he had "done enough" political spending. That is close to twice the $243.2 million that George Soros, the hedge fund founder and leading Democratic donor, has given personally to federal committees over 47 years of FEC records dating to 1979.

The comparison counts only money Soros gave in his own name. Including the roughly $210.5 million his Fund for Policy Reform has given to Democracy PAC since 2020, his federal total rises to about $453.7 million.

Most of Musk's money this year has gone to America PAC, the super PAC he founded in 2024, and to the Senate Leadership Fund, the main group backing Republican Senate candidates, which received $75 million from him on Sept. 9 and $83 million on Sept. 23. He also gave at least $20 million to the Congressional Leadership Fund, its House counterpart, and $10 million to the Republican Governors Association.

Texas has drawn the largest share. More than $200 million of his spending has backed Attorney General Ken Paxton's run for the U.S. Senate against Democrat James Talarico, and about $560 million had been spent on the race by late October, the most of any contest in the country.

Uihlein, Yass and Bloomberg trail

No other donor is close. Richard and Elizabeth Uihlein, the Illinois couple who own packaging supplier Uline Inc., have given about $150 million, mostly to Republican groups. Jeff Yass, co-founder of trading firm Susquehanna International Group, has given about $110.4 million. George Soros and his son Alex have given $103.4 million, mostly to Democrats.

Michael Bloomberg, the former New York mayor and founder of financial data company Bloomberg LP, is the top Democratic donor at about $84 million, much of it in the final two months of the campaign. He also gave $4 million to Keisha Lance Bottoms, the former Atlanta mayor running as the Democratic candidate for governor of Georgia, with more than half of it arriving last week. Miriam Adelson, majority owner of casino operator Las Vegas Sands Corp., has given about $67.6 million.

California billionaire tax

Some of the heaviest spending is on a single state ballot measure. California voters decide on Tuesday on Proposition 40, which would impose a one-time 5% tax on the net worth of the state's roughly 200 billionaires. Opponents have raised more than $379 million to defeat it, compared with about $35 million for supporters.

Google co-founder Sergey Brin has given more than $100 million to the opposition, including $102 million to Building a Better California, a committee he founded. Former Google Chief Executive Officer Eric Schmidt and venture capitalist John Doerr have each given $40 million.

Musk, chief executive of Tesla Inc. and SpaceX, is the world's richest person, with a net worth of about $869 billion, according to Forbes.