Voting in the midterms? Follow the money.

Click here for Robert Reich's Substack article entitled "How to know whether a candidate is on your side."

It's a ringing endorsement of Ohio Democrat Sherrod Brown, a longtime senator who was defeated the last time around and is running again. Reich says: "I’ve known, worked with, and admired Brown for many years. Few people in public life have as much integrity, or shown as much concern for the lives of average working people."

Anyway, the answer to the question "how to know whether a candidate is on your side" is the subtitle to Reich's article: Follow the money.

In Sherrod's case, Reich says, the answer is obvious. "A crypto-backed PAC known as “Fairshake” just announced it would spend at least $30 million to help defeat Democrat Sherrod Brown in the race for Ohio’s Senate seat."

He goes on to say: 

“Fairshake” is funded mainly by Big Crypto firms Coinbase and Ripple and venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz. It has a war chest of more than $120 million.

In 2024, Big Crypto spent more than $40 million to defeat Brown, then chair of the Senate Banking Committee. A leading critic of crypto, Brown stopped industry-friendly crypto legislation in its tracks.

Brown lost by about 4 percentage points to GOP Senator Bernie Moreno — now a leading crypto booster in the Senate.

I don’t know of a more blatant case of big money corrupting the system.

On the subject of crypto, Reich says:

Crypto’s promised public benefits are zilch while its costs and risks are increasing by the day. There’s simply no legitimate use for crypto. Its only practical uses are tax evasion, money laundering, human trafficking, fraud, speculation, and crime.

Trump’s own crypto business should be evidence enough. The Ponzi scheme he created shows how many people will get snookered if crypto continues to syphon off their hard-earned savings.

There's a flood of money coming from the Republican side, including from pro-crypto sources. Reich says:

Zoom out on the entire 2026 midterms and you’ll see the same pattern. The largest moneyed interests — Big Crypto, AI, AIPAC, Elon Musk, and Trump’s PACs (MEGA Inc., No Going Back PAC, and Safety and Affordability PAC) — are pouring record amounts into the campaigns of candidates who will do their bidding.

Further:

Musk is backing Republican candidates who’ll help his businesses. Trump is doing the same. All told, Republicans hold nearly a two-to-one cash advantage over Democrats going into the midterms.

So far, it looks as if Ohio voters can tell what's going on:

Trump won Ohio by 11 points in 2024. Yet Brown remain 8 points ahead of Husted, 53% to 45% — a margin unchanged since June.