Does Spending Big on Elections Help You Win?

So much money, so many ads…

This year, Alaska is a ‘battleground’ state. And we’re seeing so much more activity. So, do these ads change votes? Or change opinions? Increase turnout? Reinforce an existing preference? There’s so much negativity out there as well, so do negative ads work differently from positive ones? Or do people just turn them off?

Then there’s the money being spent on them. There’s spending by the candidate, the political party and all of the numerous PACs and nonprofits. Included in all of this spending is what is called ‘Dark Money.’ This is money given to various PACs and nonprofits, but you don’t ever know who is actually giving the PACs their money. And everything is moving so fast that it is hard to get a true handle on who’s paying who even weeks or months later.

That makes everything hazy, but not impossible. We can view the information as a snapshot in time, and get just enough detail to understand the scale of political spending. And, this year, it is a lot!

For reference, here are some numbers from the 2024 election:

Nationwide, political advertisers spent a total of $11.2 billion according to AdImpact, which includes TV, cable, streaming, and online. Breaking out the number further, roughly $1.9 billion was spent for online ads (and this may be low since online ads don’t have to be fully reported). Also included in the $11.2 billion figure was approximately $2.35 billion in streaming TV services. These breakdowns are interesting, since each of the areas reaches different groups of voters.

For Alaska, the best numbers for 2024 were for individual contests since there wasn’t a US Senate race, or a Governor’s race. More than $40 million was spent on the US House race, and the campaign against Ballot Measure 2 (Ranked Choice /Open Primaries repeal) raised more than $12 million.

Now, 2026 is still a work in progress since this is being written in October before the election. But it is easy to see that spending has definitely increased.

So let’s look at a few trends we can see already:

Nationwide, AdImpact is estimating total spend of $11.6 billion for the midterm elections in 2026. This is an increase of $400 million over the entire 2024 spending. All in a midterm election year. Included in this total, the projected amount of online ads is $1.6 billion and $2.7 billion for streaming services. These numbers reflect the growing use of these types of media.

And Alaska? As of October 8, outside groups had reported spending more than $60 million on Alaska’s US Senate race, according to Federal Election Commission filings compiled by PaidForPolitics. That doesn’t include the candidates’ own campaign spending.

But the Senate race is only one of many in this year’s election. There’s the US House race and the Governor’s race. Plus all of the State House races and some State Senate seats. In June, AdImpact projected about $202 million in political advertising across all Alaska races and all media.

Thinking about Alaska’s population of 737,270 (last Census estimate in 2025) and dividing that $202 million by all of us, that comes out to $274 for every man, woman and child in the state. Further, thinking about how many people actually vote, that per-voter amount is even higher. For instance, in 2024, about 340,000 people in Alaska voted. That would put the cost at about $600 per voter.

Finding publicly available, solid, broad research looking for trends and effectiveness of political advertising over the last 10 years is difficult. Some studies focus on a political party, some on a particular type of media, and many cover 2016 or earlier. So much has changed, which makes everything particularly hazy. Rigorous study takes time. But let’s see if we can reason out what the research says on the effectiveness of all this spending.

One large 2024 study examined 617 political ads tested on more than 500,000 people. This study focused on US campaigns in 2018 and 2020 and centered around television and digital ads. One quote I found particularly interesting in the results section, “The unifying theme of the results is inconsistency.” They suggest that results depend on the circumstances and that campaigns should “experiment” with different types of ads in order to find those that are effective.

Other studies have found similarly small effects, effects that disappeared quickly, or no measurable change at all.

Some real-life examples of spending show that money and advertising are often eclipsed by outside events.

In the Texas US Senate Republican primary in 2026, AdImpact counted more than $90 million in total spending for Sen. John Cornyn. Groups supporting him outspent Ken Paxton’s groups by a 17 to 1 ratio on ads in the first round and more than 4 to 1 in the runoff. However, Paxton won the runoff easily. Why? President Trump had endorsed him the week before the election.

The Wisconsin Supreme Court race in 2025 was the most expensive judicial race in US history according to the Brennan Center at over $100 million. Elon Musk and affiliated groups specifically put in more than $20 million for Brad Schimel. However, Susan Crawford won despite the ads and the funding. In this case, one of the reasons cited was the backlash against outside money particularly associated with Elon Musk.

What does all of this mean? Research shows that ads often have small effects, and experts can’t always tell which ads or types of ads will work in any given market or situation. Nor can they be assured that any impacts from the ads would last thru the election cycle. Small effects do matter at the outside edges, but they can’t always overcome outside factors.

The jobs themselves don’t pay that much (although the benefits are good). A US member of Congress makes $174,000. The Alaska Governor? $176,000. And the influence? We’re talking about potentially $202 million in political advertising in a state with fewer than 750,000 residents. And all that money is being spent to influence who holds a relatively small number of elected offices.

So, what do you think? Is all this spending worth it? Who’s benefiting? The voter? The ad agencies? Our economy? What do Alaskans, all of us, what do we gain? Does it produce better-informed voters, better candidates, or better representation?

You decide.

Dig Deeper:

AI-Generated Political Ads -Read more about what the impact is now with AI-Generated political ads.

Alaska Public Offices Commission (APOC) – Search the numbers yourself.

How do different age groups get their news? – How does age and media choice impact where the money is spent?