Fairshake Network Spent About $154.5M, Backed Candidates in 86 Wins

By Daniel Okafor

Fairshake, Protect Progress and Defend American Jobs spent about $154.5 million on independent expenditures across 93 U.S. midterm contests, and the candidates they backed won 86 races, according to the reported spending and election results. The seven defeats left the network with an about 92% success rate.

What do the 86 wins cover?

Fairshake and its two affiliated committees posted these records across the two stages of the midterm cycle:

• All primary contests: 53 wins and four losses.
• Republican primary contests: 28 wins and no losses.
• General-election contests: 33 wins and three losses.

The combined figure is not a general-election-only count. Fifty-three wins came in primaries and 33 came in general elections, while the losses split into four primary and three general-election defeats. That distinction matters when assessing the headline: the 86 victories combine two different phases of the midterm cycle.

Where was spending concentrated?

Defend American Jobs spent about $56.6 million backing Sen. Jon Husted in Ohio's Senate race. Former U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown won, making Husted's defeat one of the network's seven losses.

Related independent expenditures supporting Nebraska Sen. Pete Ricketts topped $13 million. Andy Barr won Kentucky's Senate seat, while Reps. Bryan Steil and Bill Huizenga lost their reelection bids.

The Ohio result shows the limits of spending scale. Steil's and Huizenga's failed reelection bids make the same point in two other races.

How does the money reach candidates?

Fairshake is an independent-expenditure-only super PAC. Its political communications support candidates without coordination with candidates, campaigns or parties. The spending does not go directly to campaign accounts, so the $154.5 million bought independent electoral messaging rather than direct campaign financing.

Protect Progress and Defend American Jobs are the two committees affiliated with Fairshake. The committees support candidates from both major parties who favor crypto industry policies.

Because the committees can act without coordination, their political communications remain separate from campaign and party operations. The cross-party approach broadens the pool of candidates whose races the network can enter.

What do the losses show?

The network's about 92% record was strong, but the seven defeats set a practical boundary on the return from independent spending. The $56.6 million Ohio commitment is the largest race-specific figure provided, and it ended with the backed candidate losing. Steil's and Huizenga's defeats reinforced that limit.

For crypto policy groups, the operating lesson is that independent expenditures can build a cross-party electoral footprint without formal coordination. The network can support candidates from either side and communicate independently, but it cannot control how voters or election outcomes resolve.

The 86 wins also should not be read as direct campaign financing. Because the money did not go to candidate accounts, the record measures support delivered through political communications, not funds transferred into campaigns or policy implementation.

By the next U.S. midterm cycle, the network's 86-win benchmark will face its clearest test. A comparable cross-party record would support repeatability, while another heavily funded loss would show where independent spending stops converting into victories.