Outside groups have poured $106 million into Iowa’s Senate race since Sept. 1, triple what the candidates have raised

By Staff Reporter

WASHINGTON — Outside groups have reported spending about $106 million on Iowa’s open Senate race since Sept. 1, according to an Inquisitor review of Federal Election Commission filings, more than three times what the two nominees’ campaigns had raised in the entire cycle through September.

About $60.7 million of that came from groups backing Republican Rep. Ashley Hinson or attacking Democrat Josh Turek, and about $45.2 million from groups doing the reverse. Nearly half of the Republican-side total came from one committee: SLF PAC, the super PAC of the Senate Republican leadership known as the Senate Leadership Fund, which has reported $29.9 million in Iowa spending since Sept. 1, almost all of it against Turek. On the Democratic side, a super PAC called WinSenate has reported $20.5 million against Hinson.

The candidates themselves are smaller players in their own race. Turek’s campaign had raised $20.2 million for the cycle and Hinson’s $13.5 million as of Sept. 30, their FEC summaries show. The FEC lists Hinson under her legal name, Ashley Hinson Arenholz.

Who is spending

The filings show a race being fought largely by national committees based in Washington. The ten biggest spenders on each side since Sept. 1, combining the September items on their regular reports with the 24- and 48-hour notices they have filed since Oct. 1:

The scale matches what ad trackers are seeing. AdImpact, the media-tracking firm, counts $203 million in general-election ad spending and reservations in Iowa’s Senate race, the fifth-highest total in the country after Ohio, Texas, Michigan and Maine, according to Hearst Television. That figure includes candidate advertising and future bookings, so it is not directly comparable to the FEC totals.

Where the money comes from

Several of the committees in the race are funded mainly by other committees. Lower Costs Now, a super PAC that first filed with the FEC on Sept. 10, raised $38.2 million in its first three weeks, its third-quarter report shows: $23 million from SMP, the super PAC aligned with Senate Democratic leaders, in two transfers on Sept. 16 and Sept. 24, and $15 million from FF PAC, the Democratic super PAC known as Future Forward, on Sept. 24 and 25. It reported $27 million in cash at the end of September. WinSenate, the biggest Democratic spender against Hinson, lists the same Washington street address as SMP, 1032 15th St. NW, on its FEC filings.

Fight On Iowa, the second-largest Republican-side spender, is a so-called hybrid PAC, with a separate account that can take unlimited sums for independent spending. Its third-quarter report shows $4.66 million in receipts from July through September. Four $1 million payments, on Aug. 21, Sept. 1, Sept. 18 and Sept. 23, came from American Advancement Inc., which lists an address on Baltimore Avenue in Hyattsville, Md. The report does not describe the organization, and FEC filings do not show who funds it. The PAC also reported $250,000 from Common Sense Leadership Fund, $100,000 from Herzog Contracting Corp. of St. Joseph, Mo., $103,000 from Michael Smith, who listed his employer as Freepoint LNG, and $50,000 each from ClearPath Action and Marlene Ricketts. It also received $110,000 in transfers from the Ashley Hinson Victory Committee, a joint fundraising committee bearing the candidate’s name, with individual donors itemized as memo entries.

American Meat Producers PAC, which has reported $2.51 million in spending against Hinson in October, is a much smaller operation on paper. Its third-quarter report shows $30,000 in receipts from July through September, all from one retired donor, of which $5,000 was refunded as an over-contribution, and $56,235 in cash on Sept. 30. Its October receipts will not be public until its pre-general report, due Thursday, which covers activity through Oct. 14.

The largest single Republican-side spender has a familiar donor base. SLF PAC is the same super PAC that sent $5 million to the pro-Paxton group behind this month’s ads against James Talarico in Texas, an Inquisitor review found Tuesday.

The campaigns

The candidates’ own numbers point in different directions. Turek has outraised Hinson, $20.2 million to $13.5 million for the cycle, and more of his money came in itemized individual contributions, $10.8 million to her $5.7 million, according to the FEC summaries. But he has also spent faster. Through Sept. 30, Turek’s campaign had spent $16.5 million and had $3.6 million left, while Hinson’s had spent $8.5 million and had $6.9 million in the bank, nearly twice as much, for the final five weeks.

That gap helps explain the shape of the outside spending. Democratic groups have concentrated on attacking Hinson rather than promoting Turek: of the $45.2 million on the Democratic side since Sept. 1, about $37.8 million was spent opposing her. Republican groups have done the same to Turek, spending about $49.5 million against him and $11.2 million for Hinson. Public polls show a close race; recent surveys have put each candidate narrowly ahead.

Before September, the picture was different. Through the primary and the summer, the FEC’s processed data, which lags electronic filings by weeks, credits VoteVets with $9.76 million in spending to support Turek over the cycle and AFP Action with $3.45 million to support Hinson, the largest pro-candidate totals for each. Most of the money in the race, though, has arrived since Labor Day.

Late money

The pace has picked up. About $48.9 million of the $106 million total was reported in 24- and 48-hour notices for spending dated Oct. 1 or later, meaning nearly half of the general-election outside spending tallied here has come in the past three weeks. A handful of notices list dissemination dates later this month, for ads booked in advance.

Independent expenditures are, by law, made without coordination with the candidates. The tallies above do not include party coordinated spending, money spent by tax-exempt groups on issue ads that do not have to be reported to the FEC, or ads the campaigns pay for themselves.

What to watch

Three filings will fill in the picture. Pre-general reports, due Thursday and covering activity through Oct. 14, will show who gave to Lower Costs Now, Fight On Iowa and American Meat Producers PAC in October, and how much cash each side’s groups have left. The campaigns’ own pre-general reports will show whether Turek has closed his cash gap. And 24-hour notices, required for any independent expenditure of $1,000 or more in the final 20 days before the election, will show in close to real time whether SLF PAC and WinSenate keep spending at their current pace through Nov. 3.

How we did this

The Inquisitor downloaded every electronically filed independent expenditure naming Turek (FEC data) or Hinson (FEC data) in 2026 from the FEC’s API on Oct. 21: 739 records for Turek and 533 for Hinson. To avoid double-counting the same spending, which committees often report twice, first in a 24- or 48-hour notice and again on a periodic report, we used only the latest version of each filing; for September we took the larger of a committee’s periodic-report total or its notice total, and for October we counted notices only, removing duplicate transactions. Spending is assigned to the date the committee gave for dissemination or, if none, the expenditure date. Totals are rounded and may change as committees amend reports; Thursday’s pre-general reports will add detail.

The seat is open because Republican Sen. Joni Ernst is retiring. Iowa, like Kentucky, has drawn national money to an open seat, though far more of it than Kentucky’s race has so far.

Photo: The Iowa State Capitol in Des Moines. Paul R. Burley / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0.