Elon Musk spent $200m+ in Texas races; GOP-backed candidates lost

techNov 4, 20261118,170

James Talarico defeated scandal-plagued Republican Ken Paxton to win the Texas U.S. Senate seat, becoming the first Democrat to win a statewide election in Texas in 32 years. Elon Musk spent at least $212 million to support Paxton, funding outside ads and mailers that attacked Talarico with claims about meat bans and gender surgeries for minors. Paxton ran a largely passive campaign after winning the Republican runoff in May, gave few interviews, refused debates, and relied heavily on outside spending rather than his own campaign operation. Talarico made corruption the centerpiece of his message, repeatedly tying Paxton to big-money influence and singling out Musk’s involvement; Musk posted attacks on Talarico, including the claim that "Talarico wants to open the borders and legalize everyone to gain a permanent majority to end democracy in America." Despite the record spending, Talarico won decisively, a result that brings Democrats one seat closer to control of the U.S. Senate and undercuts Musk-backed efforts in Texas.

Alejandra Caraballo

@esqueer.net

Elon Musk thought he could run Texas as his own personal little fiefdom and he fucked around and is about to find out. BLEXAS comes for all.

8264h ago

Arg12

$500M dollars down the drain instead of providing food and healthcare to people.

Burnest Hemingway6

Ann Richards is smiling from beyond.

Alora4

I wonder if Blexas will be as lenient with his spaceport lmao

Truth Axe (CJ)3

Have fun with that Congressional testimony, fElon. Bwahahahaha.

John Roddy1

At least the state AG's office hasn't flipped to...ohhhhhhh, oh dear

DC3 in the 'sky ✈️1

Rumor was he was gonna move to Louisiana or Alabama if TX went Blue. Lemme know if he's looking for help packing.

dell cameron

@dell.bsky.social

Elon Musk dumped $14M+ into the Texas Senate race in the past 7 days alone, bringing his soft total now to $47,264,556.37. His PAC, which he funds exclusively, spent $86.82M+ this cycle. (These are just independent expenditures)

Screenshot of a dark-themed, terminal-style alert feed for Oct. 30, 2026, showing six alerts grouped by type. An expanded concentration alert shows America PAC’s spending in the Texas Senate race crossing $47 million, for a cycle total of $47.26 million. Of that, $41.37 million opposes Democrat James Talarico and $5.89 million supports Republican Ken Paxton. The race accounts for 54.4 percent of the PAC’s independent expenditures this cycle. An expanded velocity alert shows $14.16 million in Texas Senate spending over the seven days ending Oct. 30, against a $1 million threshold. Most of it, $13.27 million, opposes Talarico. Both alerts cite FEC filing 2044695, filed Oct. 30 at 7:57 pm ET.

6226h ago

TheFakefakeNews 🇩🇴5

Elon gonna move his companies to Alabama next! Hahaha!

hwyst4r.bsky.social4

I think you need to move your decimal point to the right one character, unless I'm mistaken. s/b $472,645,563.70 It makes a big (order of magnitude) difference.

Tony Serrata 🇺🇦4

Guess he lit that money on fire

Xiane - Controversial Folk Icon3

When people have truly had enough, too much, all the money in the world won't change their minds.

ₚₐᵥₑₗ ₜᵣₒₗₗₒᵥᵢcₕ🇪🇺3

And he lost bigly. Good.

deemidnight.bsky.social2

Elon Musk needs to have a reckoning

Quoting this

J.J.173

Stop. Stop. I can only get so hard.

kat b fisher 🏳️‍🌈4

So many awful narcissist wealthy power hungry people — especially men — getting the message that we the people do not like them. At all.

Gil Durán

@gilduran.com

Elon Musk is big dumb loser. Time for severe accountability. Wonderful, terrifying levels of accountability.

5324h ago

Gil Durán254

Bad News for Peter Thiel: He's not the Antichrist after all. The Antichrist would have seen this coming!

Keith Ratner5

For the rest of his natural life.

nichrome77.bsky.social4

I approve the “terrifying” part. Let’s play him videos of him giving the Nazi salute before we sentence him.

web_rant2

Argentina awaits them all. bsky.app/profile/gild...

bill doyle2

and the dems had better deliver on it. in spades!

Cdub1

Well well well if it isn’t the consequences of my actions…. Couldn’t happen to a better person.

Quoting this

web_rant2

Argentina awaits them all. bsky.app/profile/gild...

Shiv Ramdas Mens Rice Activist

@nameshiv.bsky.social

Gina Hinojosa will be the governor of Texas, eat shit and cry elon musk

6274h ago

rahaeli105

I had the flash of realization earlier that this is probably his worst nightmare and it gave me that warm glow, you know, like his rockets exploding

Michael16

Texas had made me so happy tonight for this very reason, fuck him.

M3CH410

I hope he's having a meltdown. He deserves every ounce of pain he's inflicted on our state and everyone else.

Jim Lawrence7

From Austin, I am looking forward to seeing that crying.

Ole O3

Loving that Elon's political donations seem to be toxic.

Dungargee2

Does this mean he's gonna tuck tail and run to Florida?

Quoting this

Ezra Levin ❌👑1180

I personally am looking forward to Elon facing congressional accounability for committing crimes and undermining the constitution.

Nacmtrader174

This has huge implications for the university of Texas and unfucking the damage these assholes did for trump

RexLibris2

Fascist billionaires are going to start running out of states they can threaten to move to. What's the real estate situation in Guam?

Fuck You I Quit

@fuckyouiquit.bsky.social

I just want to congratulate Elon Musk for lighting a half a billion dollars on fire to turn Texas blue, you piece of shit.

3613h ago

AF4

If he's got $$$ to burn, he can pay his fair share of taxes.

Duke871

Another amazing investment decision from a true genius

Rodger Sherman

@rodger.bsky.social

Thank you to Elon Musk for donating hundreds of millions of dollars to local media by paying to run ads for doomed fascists

4044h ago

guz1980.bsky.social1

Dear Dems, feel free to punish the trillionaire who’s funneling money to your opponents now that we’ve handed you the keys!

Quoting this

James Curle3

The economics of political advertising keeping local tv stations afloat is kinda fascinating. Like, how much of a typical station’s five-year revenue stream is election advertising?

Katherine Alejandra Cross

@quinnae.com

Elon Musk spent the GDP of a small country on one of the largest, most vicious anti-trans ad campaigns ever, only for a red state redoubt to *completely* fall to the Dems. The Witchfinder Generals have been routed. No one can claim anti-trans politics won the day here and be taken seriously.

2544h ago

Katherine Alejandra Cross146

The GOP put *all* its chips behind this, coast to coast, and is experiencing a wipeout in an election Dems were already tipped to in. We might be looking at a polling error *in Dems' favour*; miss me with any insinuation that anti-trans ads, campaigning, etc. are magic.

Creature of the Woods4

Honestly, and this is just my vibe for whatever it’s worth, but I think they’re gonna have a real hard time claiming this was because of anti trans shit. They just overturned the Jim Crow era policy of lifetime voting bans for convicted felons. Like this is about a policy shift left

Creature of the Woods1

Scrolled down and read more thoroughly—yes!!!! I concur

Quoting this

Jane Ball (living dead girl)9

we must hammer on this constantly!

Dean Obeidallah

@deanobeidallah.bsky.social

Elon Musk wasted $500 million dollars! Next we need to nationalize Musk's properties!

2944h ago

m4a1960.bsky.social2

Now KRISTINA KNICKERBOCKER AND SHERROD BROWN !

Jake Wallace2

Criminal (or civil) forfeiture would work too.

Bearish man1

Imagine if he used that money to INSTEAD sell Tesla cars at less than $20,000 to get them to everyone we would’ve been so far ahead in electric vehicles and innovation.

Sarabande the Mage1

ABSOLUTELY! He's shown that he does NOT deserve the kinds of power and wealth and WE are supplying him with a lot of it. THAT NEEDS TO CHANGE. And then change the tax laws so that the billionaires can't hide their wealth behind investments forever, while living large on borrowed money.

Quoting this

Tina Says #VoteOutTheCorruption6

Starlink! End the grifting. DOGE the bros.

Pete Fuller5

Elon $500m. Ricky Jackson $220m in Ga alone. For fuck all.

Schooley

@schooley.bsky.social

Elon Musk finds something other than a sense of humor he can’t buy.

3054h ago

FREEBROOKLYN❌👑1

That isn’t funny. That’s vewy kwool. How could anyone say something so kwool.

Brooke Harrington

@ebharrington.bsky.social

Friends and countrymen, there's something very important you should not lose sight of this evening: Elon Musk incinerated half a billion dollars to buy GOP victories tonight and got NOTHING. Bupkis. Zilch. Don't forget to celebrate the total failure of the king of the broligarch treason weasels.

2644h ago

OPSECtarian1

Maybe the rest of his money should go to people with better ideas.

Mark Hall1

Rick Jackson is a healthcare billionaire who burned $190 million of mostly his own money to lose to Keisha Lance Bottoms for Georgia Governor. Money is not the final answer anymore.

Quoting this

Marc2

#IStandWithVivian RIP Gene Wilder - this is my favorite clip of all movies of all time, fwiw

Susan of Texas2

If money can’t buy elections, the rich are screwed.

Andy Behrman

@electroboyusa.bsky.social

Elon Musk spending $350 million on the midterms makes him the absolute biggest loser of this election. #DeportElonMusk

2174h ago

Ali Adair23

Even if you-know-who pardons him, I’m sure he’s broken a lot of state laws, too.

Veronica 🇺🇸 🇮🇹 🇺🇦 🇳🇴 🇲🇽 🇩🇪 🇨🇦 🍁 🇸🇪 🇵🇷5

😂🤣😅 the Nazi got a taste of the Blue tsunami tonight 💙

Rob Bon Vivant🌊4

This is a shellacking! And I'm loving it!

Big Al2

If there was a more punch able face, I haven’t seen it yet

Philip Nemer2

He is as toxic as Trump.

Expatina2

He deserved this more than anyone else ever could.

Quoting this

Marshall Matt Dillon2

Deport musk and seize his holdings

gpridg.bsky.social2

#deportMusk #boycottX #boycottTesla #boycottStarlink #boycottAllThingsMusk #prosecuteMusk

Percy the Mars Rover

@percyrover.bsky.social

Ok nobody get mad but Elon Musk moving to Texas only for it to turn blue while the state he moved from shoots down a billionaire tax is frankly hilarious

2383h ago

Peter Gratton 3

All the companies that rushed to be on the Texas Stock Exchange recently, too—it's whole sales pitch was a red Texas.

Nyanbinary: Jamie Sharp2

This is the only context in which it becomes a funny joke Thank you for this

cortlandjim1

He needs to move to Florida next!

Alex Andreou

@sturdyalex.bsky.social

Spare a thought for Elon Musk, who sunk half a billion into this, and still couldn't get a Republican elected. In Texas. 😂

2264h ago

Crumblin Jim6

Musk better get on colonising Mars and jump in one of his rockets as it will be less hostile for him than Texas, now.

Romy3

Can this night get any better!

scorchard.bsky.social1

Again, you love to see it!

Quoting this

Jordan Hass4

lost money on twitter lost money at tesla with the cybertruck currently losing money on the internet and now losing so much money on this election all this money lost could have probably cured a disease or solved homelessness or mental health, and instead....

Philip Bump

@pbump.com

Elon Musk spent a ton of money in 2024 and Trump also won so Musk decided he was a kingmaker and went to Wisconsin and got whipped and went to Texas and got whipped. But his efforts in 2024 didn't do what he thought either.

2004h ago