华盛顿 — 在民主党人詹姆斯·塔拉里科在广播电台上连续数月的支出之后，共和党人于九月发动了一场大规模的救援行动，为肯·帕克斯顿提供支持，投入超过2亿美元以提升他们在德克萨斯州的美国参议院候选人。
WASHINGTON — After months of being outspent by Democrat James Talarico on the airwaves, Republicans launched a massive rescue mission for Ken Paxton in September, dropping over $200 million to boost their U.S. Senate candidate in Texas.
新提交的竞选财务报告显示，这场广告热潮的大部分资金来自一位高度积极的捐助者：世界首富埃隆·马斯克。
New campaign finance filings revealed that much of the advertising flurry was funded by one highly motivated donor: Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest man.
马斯克居住在得克萨斯州南部的SpaceX星基地设施附近，似乎向他在该州的美国参议院竞赛投入了近1.9亿美元。他在为帕克斯顿的空中支持提供资金方面的角色，在参议院领导基金（Senate Leadership Fund，SLF）于周四向联邦选举委员会提交的报告中得以披露。SLF是参议院共和党的主要超级政治行动委员会，也是德克萨斯州参议院竞选中花费最大的机构。
Musk, who lives near the SpaceX Starbase facility in South Texas, appears to have poured nearly $190 million into the U.S. Senate race in his adopted home state. His role in financing Paxton’s air support was disclosed in reports filed Thursday to the Federal Election Commission by Senate Leadership Fund, the Senate GOP’s main super PAC and the biggest spender in Texas’ Senate contest.
9月9日，即共和党中期党代表大会在达拉斯开幕的第一天，马斯克向SLF捐赠了7500万美元。次日，SLF将7500万美元注入一个名为德克萨斯PAC（Texas PAC）的新实体。在代表大会结束后的周末，这个新成立的超级政治行动委员会便开始在电视上播放一则关于帕克斯顿在打击性贩卖方面工作的正面广告，以及一则攻击塔拉里科的负面广告，称其主张“他们/她们，而不是你”。
On Sept. 9, the first day of the GOP midterm convention in Dallas, Musk gave $75 million to SLF. The next day, SLF put $75 million into a new entity called Texas PAC. By the weekend after the convention, the new super PAC was up on the air with a positive spot about Paxton’s work on sex trafficking and a negative ad attacking Talarico as being for “they/them, not you.”
在马斯克开出第一张支票两周后，根据该组织的提交文件，他又向SLF追加捐赠了8300万美元。果然，SLF在次日将这笔8300万美元存入了德克萨斯PAC的账户。
Two weeks after cutting his first check, Musk gave an additional $83 million to SLF, according to the group’s filing. Sure enough, SLF deposited $83 million into Texas PAC’s coffers the following day.
马斯克的捐助为共和党参议员夺得德克萨斯州的广播电台主导权提供了武器。SLF利用德克萨斯PAC作为载体来预订广告时段，据媒体跟踪公司AdImpact的数据，截至目前，SLF已在电视、广播和数字广告上花费超过1.59亿美元，这一数额是塔拉里科竞选团队支出的两倍。
Musk’s donations armed Senate Republicans to take over the airwaves in Texas. Using Texas PAC as the vessel to book airtime, SLF has thus far spent over $159 million on TV, radio and digital advertising, double the outlay from Talarico’s campaign, according to media tracking firm AdImpact.
SLF在初选中支持参议员约翰·科宁，估计帕克斯顿若参选将需要1.5亿至2亿美元才能保住该席位——这笔资金可能来自其他州的削减。虽然这一预测被证明是准确的，但马斯克的投资已经改变了这一计算。
SLF backed Sen. John Cornyn in the primary, estimating that a Paxton candidacy would require $150 million to $200 million to retain the seat — money that could come at the expense of other states. While the prediction proved prescient, Musk’s investment has changed the calculus.
“得益于一些慷慨投资者向附属组织德克萨斯州政治行动委员会捐款，我们得以支持肯·帕克斯顿，”参议院领导基金执行主任亚历克斯·拉塔姆周三在彭博电视上表示。“我们将在该竞选中花费近2亿美元。但同样，感谢参议院共和党领袖约翰·桑恩、共和党党团以及我们的筹款工作，我们不必从其他州抽调资源来做到这一点。”
“Thanks to some generous investors who have dedicated money to an affiliate, Texas PAC, we’ve been able to go in and support Ken Paxton,” SLF executive director Alex Latcham told Bloomberg TV Wednesday. “We’ll spend nearly $200 million in that race. But again, thanks to Leader John Thune and the Republican caucus and our fundraising, we haven’t had to subtract resources from other states to do so.”
特斯拉和SpaceX创始人在其政治团队联系参议院领导基金——参议院共和党的主要外部竞选组织——表达马斯克对帕克斯顿在竞选中地位的担忧后介入了这场竞选，一位知情人士透露。这促成了马斯克圈子与参议院领导基金之间的一项协议——马斯克将向孤星自由政治行动委员会提供1000万美元，该委员会是支持帕克斯顿的主要外部组织，前提是参议院领导基金提供500万美元，且该委员会再筹集500万美元。该谈话细节最早由Axios报道。
The Tesla and SpaceX founder got involved in the race after his political team reached out to Senate Leadership Fund, the Senate GOP’s main outside campaign group, to voice Musk’s concerns about Paxton’s standing in the race, according to a person familiar with the conversations. That led to an agreement between Musk’s orbit and SLF — Musk would provide $10 million to Lone Star Liberty PAC, the main outside group boosting Paxton, if SLF gave $5 million and the PAC raised an additional $5 million. The details of the conversation were first reported by Axios.
这笔意外之财急需。孤星自由政治行动委员会在6月底时账户仅剩3.5万美元，此前已为帕克斯顿在初选中艰难击败科宁而耗尽资金。与此同时，塔拉里科仍在保持猛烈的筹款势头，若帕克斯顿得不到援助，他有望继续主导政治广告支出战。
That windfall was badly needed. Lone Star Liberty PAC had only $35,000 in the bank at the end of June, having drained its coffers on Paxton’s hard-fought primary win over Cornyn. Talarico, meanwhile, was continuing his torrid fundraising pace and was poised to keep dominating the political ad spending battle if help did not arrive for Paxton.
在帕克斯顿的参议院领导基金助力的广告攻势中，塔拉里科又创下一个季度筹款纪录，7月至9月间筹得6400万美元——创下美国所有参议院候选人的第三季度筹款纪录。这位奥斯坦民主党人在非党派公众调查的平均值中已保持数月的民调领先，这对共和党来说堪忧，该党在得克萨斯州全州范围选举中保持着超过三十年的不败纪录。
Talarico posted another record quarter amid Paxton’s SLF-powered ad surge, hauling in $64 million between July and September — a third-quarter record among all U.S. Senate candidates. The Austin Democrat has maintained a polling lead for months in averages of nonpartisan public surveys, an alarming sight for a Republican Party whose unbeaten streak in Texas statewide races spans more than three decades.
在马斯克的捐款和配套资金的支持下，孤星自由政治行动委员会（Lone Star Liberty PAC）在9月初花费1750万美元投放广播电视广告，远超其他任何支持帕克斯顿的竞选广告投入，成为大选期间规模最大的亲帕克斯顿广告采购。到当月结束时，由SLF牵头的一些外部团队在德克萨斯州参议院竞赛中的广告支出已超过2.17亿美元。
With Musk’s donation and the matching funds, Lone Star Liberty PAC spent $17.5 million on broadcast TV advertising in early September, by far the most significant pro-Paxton ad buy of the general election. By the end of the month, a handful of outside groups led by SLF had dropped over $217 million on ads in the Texas Senate race.
X并未参与帕克斯顿的“大科技”十字军行动。帕克斯顿尚未就马斯克的支持发表公开评论。
X not a part of Paxton’s Big Tech crusade Paxton has not commented publicly about Musk’s support.
过去，德克萨斯州总检察长曾称赞马斯克在2024年支持共和党人。他表示，在那年的选举前两天，他曾在马斯克家中度数小时，聆听马斯克详述自己为提振共和党候选人所做的一切努力，并在2024年美国保守派联盟年会（Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest）上如此说道。
In the past, the attorney general has praised Musk for backing Republicans in 2024. He spent hours at Musk’s home two days before that year’s election hearing Musk recount all his efforts to boost GOP candidates, Paxton said at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest in 2024.
“你们难道不高兴他站在我们这边吗？”帕克斯顿在人群的欢呼声中说道。“我相信，无论他做了什么，无论是什么火箭科学方面的事情，都对这次选举产生了巨大影响。”帕克斯顿还通过担任德克萨斯州总检察长的身份与马斯克保持一致——并且在其办公室日益卷入对大科技公司的监管过程中，基本回避了对马斯克旗下公司的审查。
“Aren’t you all glad he’s on our side?”Paxton said to cheers. “I am convinced that whatever he did, whatever rocket science thing he did, made a huge difference in this election.”Paxton has also aligned himself with Musk through his role as Texas attorney general — and largely skirted scrutinizing Musk’s companies as his office has increasingly taken on Big Tech.
2022年，当马斯克试图收购Twitter时，帕克斯顿启动了对该社交媒体公司的调查，审查其如何报告平台上虚假或机器人账号的数量——即检查该服务是否通过夸大实际用户数量来提升其估值以增加收入。当时，马斯克也在提出类似质疑。他最终收购了Twitter并将其更名为X。2024年，帕克斯顿对代表广告主的世界广告主联合会（World Federation of Advertisers）展开调查，以评估其成员是否在串通抵制特定社交媒体服务。
In 2022, as Musk sought to buy Twitter, Paxton opened an investigation into the social media company for how it reported the number of accounts on the platform that were fake or bots — inspecting whether the service was inflating the number of its actual users to boost its value for revenue. At the time, Musk was raising similar questions. He ultimately bought Twitter and renamed it In 2024, Paxton opened an investigation into World Federation of Advertisers, an organization that represents marketers, to assess whether its members were conspiring to boycott specific social media services.
《科技晶报》（TechCrunch）报道称，马斯克旗下的X曾对该组织提起反垄断诉讼，很可能是被调查的社交媒体平台之一。
TechCrunch reported Musk’s X, which had filed an antitrust suit against the group, was likely among the social media platforms.
与此同时，帕克斯顿还针对Netflix、WhatsApp、Discord和Meta等科技巨头展开调查——这些行动他在竞选途中一直在宣传。
Meanwhile, Paxton has taken on tech giants including Netflix, WhatsApp, Discord, and Meta — probes he has touted on the campaign trail.
“作为得州司法部长，我曾起诉全球一些最大的公司……因为他们通过让儿童接触危险、上瘾的内容来利用我们的孩子，”帕克斯顿在五月击败科宁后说道。“在华盛顿，我将继续为保护德州儿童免受大科技公司侵害而奋斗。”但帕克斯顿也因被指对X和马斯克视而不见而受到批评者的指责。一月份，一群民主党州议员要求司法部长调查该平台的人工智能代理Grok及其生成的关于儿童和妇女的剥削性内容。帕克斯顿未就此信公开回应。
“As attorney general, I’ve sued some of the largest companies in the world … for taking advantage of our kids by exposing them to dangerous, addictive material,” Paxton said after defeating Cornyn in May. “In Washington, I will not stop fighting to protect Texas children from Big Tech.”But Paxton has taken arrows from critics who’ve accused him of turning a blind eye to X and Musk. In January, a group of Democratic state representatives demanded the attorney general investigate the platform’s artificial intelligence agent, Grok, and its creation of exploitative content about children and women. Paxton did not respond to the letter publicly.
同月，全国多州司法部长组成的一个团体向马斯克的公司发出信函，要求其解决其人工智能代理生成儿童性虐待内容的问题。帕克斯顿未在签署名单中。
The same month, a group of attorneys general from across the country sent Musk’s company a letter demanding that it address its AI agent’s creation of child sex abuse content. Paxton was not among the signatories.
资助共和党基层行动马斯克的政治运作也深度参与了德州的共和党基层行动，从挨家挨户走访到邮寄宣传材料，覆盖多个关键选区。据FEC文件显示，他上一季度向America PAC注入近9000万美元，该组织截至周二已向参议院选举投入1880万美元，这些资金用于短信、邮寄材料和广告等渠道，但不包括逐街走访和电话银行等线下走访活动。其中超过80%的资金用于反塔利可的信息传播。
Funding the GOP ground game Musk’s political operation is also deeply involved in the Republican ground game in Texas, from canvassing to mailers, across several key races. America PAC, which he seeded with nearly $90 million last quarter, had pumped $18.8 million into the Senate race through Tuesday, per FEC filings, which capture efforts like text messaging, mailers and ads but not in-person canvassing such as block-walking and phone-banking. Over 80% of that money has gone to anti-Talarico messaging.
这位科技巨头在孤星州有重要的商业利益。近年来，马斯克已将多家公司的注册地迁至德州。无聊公司和X的总部设在巴斯特罗普，SpaceX位于布朗斯维尔附近，特斯拉的公司总部如今位于奥斯汀。
The tech mogul has significant business interests in the Lone Star State. Musk has moved the state of incorporation for many of his companies to Texas in recent years. Boring Company and X are headquartered in Bastrop, SpaceX is near Brownsville and Tesla’s corporate headquarters is now in Austin.
这不仅仅是参议院选举的问题。马斯克的政治行动委员会在得克萨斯州五个竞争最激烈的美国众议院选区中，花费了约80万美元来支持共和党候选人。其中最大一部分资金投入了第35国会选区，这是圣安东尼奥地区的一个席位，共和党人去年夏天重新划定选区边界，意图翻转该席位，但该选区已被证明竞争非常激烈。
And it’s not just the Senate race. Musk’s PAC has spent about $800,000 boosting Republican candidates in the five most competitive U.S. House races in Texas. The biggest share has gone to the 35th Congressional District, a San Antonio-area seat Republicans redrew last summer with the intention of flipping, but which has proven highly competitive.
马斯克在2024年花费数亿美元支持共和党人，包括唐纳德·特朗普的总统竞选。特朗普任命马斯克领导有争议的政府效率部计划，以此回报马斯克。同年晚些时候，两人公开决裂，当时马斯克贬低了特朗普的标志性立法努力，并声称特朗普出现在杰弗里·爱泼斯坦的档案中。
Musk spent hundreds of millions in 2024 to boost Republicans, including Donald Trump’s presidential bid. Trump rewarded Musk by tapping him to lead the controversial Department of Government Efficiency initiative. The two had a public falling out later that year, when Musk disparaged the president’s signature legislative effort and alleged Trump was in the Jeffrey Epstein files.
这场争执似乎并未削弱马斯克为共和党政治支出买单的意愿。世界首富本轮选举周期的政治支出已超过其2024年的支出，而得克萨斯州是其行动的最大焦点。
The dustup did not appear to sap Musk’s appetite for bankrolling Republicans’ political spending. The world’s wealthiest man has already surpassed his 2024 political spending this cycle, with Texas the largest focus of his operation.
其他共和党团体也在利用马斯克在得克萨斯州的支出热潮进行筹款。
Other GOP groups are fundraising off of Musk’s Texas spending bonanza as well.
“伊隆·马斯克知道在极左民主党统治下生活是什么感觉，”一封全国共和党参议员委员会的筹款邮件写道，该邮件指出马斯克在中期选举中花费了2.76亿美元，并指引读者前往WinRed筹款页面。“他逃离了加利福尼亚州的压迫性政权，该政权以激进议程瘫痪了该州，之后才在得克萨斯州找到了新家。但现在，那些把加利福尼亚州搞得一团糟的同样极左民主党人，正试图夺取伊隆的新家！”
“Elon Musk understands what it’s like to live under far left Democrats,” reads one National Republican Senatorial Committee fundraising email, which notes that Musk has spent $276 million in the midterms and directs readers to a WinRed fundraising page. “He fled an oppressive regime in California that crippled the state with a radical agenda before finding a new home in Texas. But now, the same Far Left Democrats that ran California into the ground are coming to SEIZE Elon’s new home!”
尽管远未达到马斯克的投资水平，但新的文件显示，一些著名的得克萨斯州共和党捐款人在最近几个月也为帕克斯顿重新出山。
While far from reaching Musk’s investment levels, some prominent Texas GOP donors also came off the sidelines for Paxton in recent months, new filings show.
得克萨斯州西部石油亿万富翁法里斯·威尔克斯，此前曾支持帕克斯顿的州级竞选，并向强硬派共和党人投入数百万美元，他在8月中旬向帕克斯顿的一个联合筹款委员会捐赠了25万美元，这是他本轮选举周期的首笔联邦支出。
West Texas oil billionaire Farris Wilks, who has supported Paxton in his state campaigns and directed millions to hardline Republicans, donated $250,000 to one of Paxton’s joint fundraising committees in mid-August, his first federal expenditure of the cycle.
与此同时，阿马里洛亿万富翁亚历克斯·费尔利在春天向帕克斯顿的直接竞选账户捐款7000美元，已达到捐款上限；8月下旬，他又向帕克斯顿的联合筹款委员会捐款274300美元。
Amarillo billionaire Alex Fairly, meanwhile, had maxed out to Paxton’s direct campaign account with a $7,000 donation in the spring; in late August, he gave $274,300 to Paxton’s joint fundraising committee.
本季度，帕克斯顿还从达拉斯牛仔队高层处收到大笔款项。球队总裁斯蒂芬·琼斯和首席销售与营销官杰里·琼斯 Jr. 分别捐款122000美元和100000美元。他们的父亲、牛仔队老板杰里·琼斯在第二季度捐款六位数。
Paxton also received large sums this quarter from the Dallas Cowboys brass. Team president Stephen Jones and chief sales and marketing officer Jerry Jones Jr. gave $122,000 and $100,000, respectively. Their father, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, donated a six-figure sum in the second quarter.
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