According to the source, top figures at Y Combinator are working to influence the 2026 election cycle through contributions to 66 different federal political action committees (PACs). The Y Combinator Management LLC Political Committee, also called the Little Tech PAC, has spent $117,647 to bolster a mix of progressive and right‑wing candidates, including Rep. Lateefah Simon, Rep. Pramila Jayapal, Sen. Ted Cruz, Sen. Josh Hawley and the late Sen. Lindsey Graham. The PAC was registered on Dec. 15, 2025, per its FEC filing, and has raised $200,000 from 40 contributions, nearly all from YC employees, executives and their partners. Notable contributors include co‑founders Paul Graham and Jessica Livingston, president and CEO Garry Tan, head of public policy Travis Lowe (who made the first contribution on Dec. 18), YC partner Jared Friedman and managing director Jonathan Levy, many of whom gave the annual maximum of $5,000 in both 2025 and 2026. The designated agent is Verene Prescher, YC’s head of finance, and the treasurer is Justin Phillips of Aristotle, an election consulting firm that claims to have worked with every sitting president since 1983. Contributions have been distributed coast to coast, with the highest numbers in California, followed by Washington, D.C., Texas and Virginia. The vast majority of the money has gone toward the reelection of incumbents rather than challengers. While the PAC’s exact goal is unclear, many of the supported legislators have worked on AI and tech policy at the federal level. The nickname “Little Tech PAC” reflects Tan’s advocacy for early‑stage “little tech” companies versus “Big Tech,” which he has criticized for slowing innovation and concentrating economic and political power. Tan wrote on X in March 2025, ahead of YC’s Little Tech Competition Summit in Washington, D.C., “We want 10,000 flowers to bloom and for startups to have every chance to give consumers choice and for there to be truly free markets that create prosperity everywhere.” The PAC gave $3,500 to a PAC supporting North Carolina Democrat Rep. Valerie Foushee, who serves on the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, the New Democrat Coalition AI Working Group and the House Bipartisan AI Task Force, and advocates leveraging the 2022 CHIPS & Science Act to boost superconductor production. It also contributed $3,000 to the PAC of Washington Democrat Rep. Adam Smith, the Democratic leader and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, who has emphasized the Department of Defense’s need to acquire new technology and develop advanced command‑and‑control systems. The chairman of that committee, Republican Rep. Mike Rogers of Alabama, received a $3,000 contribution; Rogers has praised securing more than $1 trillion in additional military funding and, per an investigation by The Lever, holds between $1.7 and $2.6 million in companies that would benefit from streamlined tech regulations and pro‑AI policy. Additional funds went to pro‑AI legislators without committee seats, such as Alaska Republican Rep. Dan Sullivan, who said on Sept. 17 that American AI progress and preventing Communist China from winning the AI race are priorities for him. The PAC also backed Virginia Republican Rep. Rob Wittman, who supports Donald Trump’s “Genesis Mission” to accelerate AI in America, despite an ongoing effort to flip his seat reported by Politico. Some of the AI‑supporting recipients, including Sens. Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz, have backed data‑center moratoriums and industry regulations while still advocating for AI development in the United States. Y Combinator and the Little Tech PAC did not respond to questions from Gazetteer SF about the PAC’s contributions and goals by press time.
