Winklevoss super PAC reports first Texas Senate mail buy of $81,000

Digital Freedom Fund, the super political action committee launched by Gemini co-founders Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss in 2025, made its first Texas spending of the 2026 cycle, reporting more than $81,000 in direct mail to support Republican Ken Paxton and oppose Democrat James Talarico in the state's Senate race.

The filing, dated Oct. 20 with the Federal Election Commission, lists a single vendor: Minute Mail Consulting Group LLC of New Smyrna Beach, Florida. Its stated purpose is "DIRECT MAIL: PRINTING AND POSTAGE," with public distribution set for Oct. 19, the day early voting began in Texas.

Two lines on that schedule add up to the Texas total. The committee reported $77,424.28 spent to oppose Talarico and $4,074.96 to support Paxton, both in the same mailing. Combined, they come to $81,499.24.

Cointelegraph first reported the filing on Oct. 22, describing it as the PAC's first ad spending to back Paxton in the contest for one of Texas' Senate seats. The committee told the outlet it had raised roughly $34 million as of Sept. 30.

Texas was not the only state on the same form. The filing also shows $41,953.25 in mail opposing Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown and $2,208.07 supporting Republican Jon Husted, plus $4,981.31 for Iowa Republican Joshua Turek and $262.17 for Iowa's Ashley Hinson Arenholz. Every line on the report totals $130,904.04. Digital Freedom Fund has put about $7 million into media purchases for Husted, according to the same report.

The PAC is one of several crypto-aligned groups spending into the midterms. Fairshake, funded by Ripple Labs, Coinbase and Andreessen Horowitz, reported more than $13 million combined on direct mail this week, including over $4 million to oppose independent Dan Osborn in Nebraska and $9 million to back Husted over Brown, the filing shows. Fairshake had invested about $56 million in Ohio's Senate race as of Wednesday.

The form itself was signed on Oct. 20 by Charles Gantt, the committee staffer who completed it. Year-to-date figures attached to each race put the PAC's Ohio spending at about $6.97 million per candidate in that contest, matching the roughly $7 million total the committee has described. In Iowa, the two lines on this filing sit against calendar totals above $575,000 each.

Spending into candidates who back crypto legislation comes as event contracts on Kalshi and Polymarket heavily favored Democrats retaking control of the House and Senate in 2027, Cointelegraph reported. Whichever party holds each chamber would shape the fate of bills like the Digital Asset Market Clarity Act, a market structure measure that failed a procedural Senate vote last month.

The Texas mail landed as Paxton and Talarico campaigned through the final stretch. Paxton won the Republican primary in May with help from $500,000 in supportive ads funded by the Fellowship PAC, a committee backed by Anchorage Digital and Cantor Fitzgerald. Those ads ran through the Nxum Group, a marketing company co-founded by Bo Hines, a former crypto adviser to President Donald Trump who became chief executive of Tether US after leaving the White House. The outlet also cited an October Wall Street Journal report saying Nxum received $6.3 million as part of a deal with Tether, with the first payment arriving while Hines was still at the White House.

The Senate race is drawing national money on both sides. FEC filings show Elon Musk has poured more than $150 million into the Senate Leadership Fund, which supports Republican Senate candidates, and sent the same amount to the Texas PAC that has backed Paxton with ads. Republicans are spending heavily to keep the state from electing Democratic Senate and gubernatorial seats for the first time in more than 30 years.

The committee's filing covers races in Texas, Iowa and Ohio at once, and the outlet said it represents one of the PAC's first forays into the Lone Star State.

Cointelegraph said it contacted the Paxton and Talarico campaign teams for comment and did not receive an immediate response. Early voting runs from Oct. 19 to Oct. 30, and Election Day is Nov. 3.