Democrats Take Congress After Crypto’s Election Spending Fails | CoinDesk Daily

Democrats were projected to take control of both chambers of Congress, while a major crypto-backed effort in Ohio failed to unseat Senator Brown. Crypto super PACs spent $63 million trying to defeat him, but Brown won his seat back. The result shows that substantial spending did not secure this high-profile target; it does not, by itself, establish how effective crypto spending was in other races.

Elizabeth Warren, widely viewed as crypto’s strongest opponent in Congress, was likely to chair the Senate Banking Committee. Any crypto bill would need to clear that committee, making its leadership a consequential obstacle for legislation. Her expected role raises the prospect of a difficult path for crypto bills, though it does not establish that the committee would reject any particular proposal.

Democrats’ congressional gains also raised questions about the outlook for AI infrastructure. Gina Hinejosa won in Texas on a platform supporting a moratorium on AI data centers, and Texas accounts for 27% of planned U.S. data center power capacity. That makes the state a significant focus for the debate over future data-center construction, but the synopsis does not specify the scope or likely effect of the proposed moratorium.

After Republican losses, Elon Musk wrote on X that data centers in space “look pretty appealing right now.” The comment came amid those election results, but no direct connection between the losses and a change in data-center plans was established.

Jack Dorsey’s payments company Block agreed to pay the Justice Department $764 million to settle a probe into its anti-money-laundering controls. The settlement amount exceeds the $566 million in profit Block reported for the third quarter, though those figures refer to different measures and the synopsis does not specify a settlement period. Separately, Block’s Bitcoin gross profit fell 50% to $52 million last quarter.