Latest / Uncensored Objection / One man has spent three hundred sixty-six million dollars to shape this year’s midterms.

Transcript

One man has spent three hundred sixty-six million dollars to shape this year’s midterms. · Uncensored Objection

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_01: Let me give you a number, and I want you to sit with it for a second.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_01: $366 million.
• 0:07
  SPEAKER_01: That is how much one man has spent to shape this year's midterm elections.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: One man, one wallet.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: And here is the question that should bother every American, regardless of party.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_01: If one person's money can outweigh millions of votes, do we still have a democracy?
• 0:23
  SPEAKER_01: Or do we have an auction?
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: That is the right question, and the man's name is Elon Musk.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: So let us break this down, because the numbers here are genuinely historic.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: Where did the money go?
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_01: Here's the breakdown.
• 0:34
  SPEAKER_01: And every figure comes from this week's federal filings.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_01: Since July alone,
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_01: Musk has put more than $276 million into Republican groups and his own super PAC.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_01: Start with the big one.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_01: $158 million to the Senate Leadership Fund.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_01: In one summer.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_01: That is the most that group has ever taken from a single donor in a single quarter.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_01: And get this.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_01: It is more than its Democratic rival raised from every donor it had combined.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_00: One donor out-raised an entire party's donor base.
• 1:05
  SPEAKER_00: Let that sink in.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_01: Then another $76 million to AmericaPAC, his own outfit.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_01: And here's what that money bought.
• 1:12
  SPEAKER_01: AmericaPAC paid canvassers between $1.50 and $3 a door to knock
• 1:17
  SPEAKER_01: on 6.5 million doors,
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_01: then $20 million to the Congressional Leadership Fund,
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_01: $10 million to the Super PAC backing Ken Paxton,
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_01: $10 million to the Republican Governors Association,
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_01: and $2 million to the Republican Attorneys General Association.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so here is what I want to push on.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Back in May of 2025, Musk said, and I quote, I am going to do a lot less in the future.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: What changed?
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_01: What changed is he is back to having dinner with Trump.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_01: His total this cycle comes to about $366 million,
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_01: on top of roughly $290 million in 2024, to put Trump and Republicans back in power.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_01: And Jill,
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_01: that counts only the money we know about,
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_01: because he also sends millions through groups that never have to name their donors.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_01: The real number is bigger.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_01: We just cannot see it.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: Dark money.
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: The dollars nobody has to admit to.
• 2:07
  SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_01: Now here is the framework Mitch Jackson wants everyone to understand,
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_01: because this is where his 40 years of cross-examining the powerful kicks in.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_01: Every dollar a billionaire spends on an election is an investment,
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_01: and investors always come to collect.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_01: So follow the money.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: Where does it lead?
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_01: Musk lives in Austin.
• 2:27
  SPEAKER_01: He has major business and property interests in Texas,
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_01: and his empire feeds on enormous federal contracts.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_01: Now look at Ken Paxton, the Texas Attorney General running for Senate.
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_01: Paxton has investigated Musk's opponents, including media matters.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_01: Musk's $10 million hit Paxton's super PAC right when Paxton was getting badly outspent.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: And the $158 million landed at the Senate Leadership Fund right before that group,
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: run by allies of Majority Leader John Thune,
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_01: launched a $149 million ad campaign for Paxton.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: So the money arrives exactly when the candidate needs it most, and the favor bank opens later.
• 3:03
  SPEAKER_01: The return shows up later, in who gets investigated and who gets the contract.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_01: That is not a conspiracy theory.
• 3:10
  SPEAKER_01: That is how the machine works.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_01: And it is all legal.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Which brings us to why it is legal.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: Citizens United.
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_01: The 2010 Supreme Court ruling that opened the floodgates to unlimited outside spending.
• 3:21
  SPEAKER_01: It built the super PAC machine Musk runs today.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: And Mitch has a line about this that I think nails it.
• 3:27
  SPEAKER_01: Free speech stops being free the moment only billionaires afford the loudest version of it.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_00: That is a devastating sentence.
• 3:35
  SPEAKER_00: Because the nurse working a double shift has free speech too.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Technically, she just cannot afford $158 million worth of it.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_01: A billionaire deserves the same say in who runs this country as a nurse working
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_01: a double shift and not one ounce more.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_01: That is the principle.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_01: And right now, we are nowhere close to it.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: Okay, so we have laid out the problem, and it is a big one.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_00: What is the fix?
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because Mitch does not do despair.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: He does playbooks.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_01: Two moves.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_01: Move 1.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_01: Congress passes laws that drag every hidden dollar into daylight and put a hard cap
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_01: on what any one person directly or indirectly spends to sway a race.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_01: No more dark money groups that never name their donors.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: Every dollar disclosed.
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_01: Every donor named.
• 4:20
  SPEAKER_00: And move 2?
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_01: Move 2.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_01: The rest of us push through a constitutional amendment that kills Citizens United for good.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_01: That is the long game.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_01: And it is the only thing that permanently ends the auction.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_00: So here is the action step, and I want everyone listening to actually do this one.
• 4:36
  SPEAKER_00: Tell your senators and your representative you want both.
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: The number is 202-224-3121.
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: And ask every candidate on your November ballot where they stand on this,
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: because Musk already placed his $366 million bet on this election,
• 4:54
  SPEAKER_00: and the one thing left that outweighs it is your vote.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_01: That is still the most powerful currency in American politics, but only if you spend it.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_01: And if you got value from this episode,
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_01: join trial lawyer Mitch Jackson and the rest of us
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_01: on his Uncensored Objection Substack,
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_01: where Mitch applies 40 years of legal experience to cross-examine the powerful
• 5:27
  SPEAKER_01: and show you what the law actually says, behind the breaking political headlines.
• 5:32
  SPEAKER_01: Visit and subscribe at uncensoredobjection.com.
• 5:35
  SPEAKER_01: That is uncensoredobjection.com.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: We will see you next time.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: And remember, the auction ends when the voters show up.