‘What does money from a Super PAC actually buy?’: our reporters are answering your election questions now

brooklandia897 asks: Could you talk about the California races and how likely it is that the Prop 40 billionaire tax will go through? Obviously billions have been spent by billionaires trying to stop that one! So is there hope for it actually going through in spite of all that?

Dara: The billionaire tax is looking to be the most expensive ballot measure race in California history, which is saying something since we saw Uber and Lyft spend more than $200m to defeat a ballot measure for workers in 2000. For Prop 40, tech-backed Super Pacs are spending hand-over-fist to defeat the measure. The biggest spending Super Pac is called Building a Better California and has seen donations from several Silicon Valley venture capitalists and tech royalty, including Google co-founder Sergey Brin and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt. (Also, weirdly, Kim DeGeorge, the wife of the wealthy owner of the Alo yoga clothing brand, has been a regular donor). Since the Super Pac launched in February, it’s raised $229m.

Just for background, Prop 40 would put a one-time 5% tax on all billionaires living in the state. The proceeds would go to mostly fund healthcare programs, along with some education and food assistance programs.

Polling for Prop 40 shows that voters are leaning to support the measure, but that support has lost strength over the past few weeks. Still, the measure has the support of California’s Democratic party and the powerful California Federation of Labor Unions.

Complicating matters are Prop 41 and Prop 42, two separate measures that billionaire tax opponents got onto the November ballot. Prop 41 directly targets Prop 40, and Prop 42 is more of a general anti-wealth tax. If either of these measures get more “yes” votes, they will stop Prop 40 from taking effect – even if Prop 40 passes. So California’s billionaire class is spending not only to defeat Prop 40, but to push Prop 41 and 42.

NorthLondonIsRed asks: When a Super PAC or corporate donor spends heavily on a race, what does that money actually buy in practice? Is it mostly ad volume, field organizing, opposition research, or something else? And how much measurable difference does that spending make in swinging votes compared to factors like incumbency or local turnout?

Chris Stein: A Super Pac has wide latitude for what it can spend its funds on in support of a candidate or cause. Typically, Super Pacs run advertisements in the media — think television, streaming services and websites — produce campaign signs and bumper stickers, and fund canvassing and phone banking. Does this make a difference? It depends on the race. This year, the Super Pac connected to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac), called the United Democracy Project (UDP), spent heavily to support Democratic congressman Wesley Bell in St Louis, Missouri, who was facing a primary challenge from Cori Bush, the former US House lawmaker he unseated with the UDP’s assistance in 2024. Bush was outspent and Bell won his primary by a wide margin, but when I reported on this race from St Louis it became clear the former congresswoman had other issues beside lack of funds. But UDP also spent heavily in Michigan’s Democratic Senate primary to support congresswoman Haley Stevens against Abdul El-Sayed. It didn’t work — El-Sayed won the nomination, albeit by a narrower margin than expected.

Joseph, Dara Kerr and Chris are live answering your questions now.

Welcome to our second live Q&A about the upcoming midterm elections. Today, our reporters will be joining us to answer your questions about who is funding the campaigns, where the money is going and how it’s shaping the election outlook ahead of the votes on 3 November.

In the past few months our reporting team has covered in depth:

Joining us on Friday at 11am EDT are political breaking news reporter Joseph Gedeon, tech reporter Dara Kerr and senior politics reporter Chris Stein.

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The US politics team is hosting a series of reader Q&As leading up to the November midterms elections. See our first conversation on the Democrats’ midterms hopes.