Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei made a $1 million personal donation to super PAC Public First, a political group that advocates regulations on artificial intelligence.
The AI advocacy group received Amodei’s donation in May, according to Federal Election Commission filings released late Wednesday, and is free to allocate it to campaigns for or against political figures.
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Anthropic, as a company, has also contributed to Public First Action, the umbrella organization to which Public Action belongs. It announced a $20 million donation in February.
Public First Action, a nonpartisan 501(c)(4) organization founded by former Reps. Chris Stewart (R-UT) and Brad Carson (D-OK) in November 2025, supports candidates committed to imposing safety regulations on artificial intelligence.
“We’ve seen what happens when government fails to act on other emerging technologies,” Stewart said in a statement. “With AI, the stakes are enormous, and we can’t afford to make the same missteps.”
The three super PACs associated with Public First Action, Jobs and Democracy, Public First, and Defending Our Values have a combined total of roughly just $1.8 million of cash on hand.
In contrast, the super PAC pushing for rapid AI development, Leading the Future, has not raised any funds beyond the $75 million it previously collected, according to FEC filings, but still had $31 million cash on hand as of June 30.
“Leading the Future has laid out a clear, positive, and proactive agenda that focuses on establishing a responsible national framework on AI,” the Leading the Future head of comments, Jesse Hunt, told the Washington Examiner. “We’re proud of our track record supporting a diverse array of policymakers and candidates across the country.”
Amodei’s seven-figure political donation isn’t his first, as he has supported politicians with smaller amounts in the past. For example, Amodei made a personal $5,000 donation to the Biden Victory Group in 2020 while he was still the vice president of research at OpenAI.
His donation to Public First came during pivotal moments in the AI proxy war in New York, where the pro-regulations Jobs and Democracy PAC spent millions to elect tech-safety advocate Alex Bores, while the rival anti-regulation PAC Think Big spent millions to defeat him, ultimately helping establishment candidate Micah Lasher win New York’s 12th Congressional District seat in Manhattan.
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Wednesday’s FEC filings showed that five other Anthropic employees donated more than $2 million to Public First.
On the same note, the committee also received a $250,000 donation from a Google DeepMind employee and $5,000 from Anthropic rival OpenAI.
