 JD Vance, a so-called populist outsider who worked in private equity and benefited from tax loopholes designed for the rich, will now be a U.S. Senator, thanks to his billionaire benefactor Peter Thiel. Thiel alone was one of the largest individual donors in the midterm elections, doling out at least $32 million, with most of his campaign cash spent on two super PACs created to support his Silicon Valley protégés. Thiel wasn't the only billionaire to bed big in 2022 either. 465 billionaires pumped $881 million into the 2022 midterm elections before October in support of both political parties, although a majority of those donations went to Republicans. When we get fourth quarter campaign finance disclosures next January, their donations will easily climb over $1 billion, with the 2022 election set to be the most expensive midterm in history. Even though many extremist big-money candidates, aside from Vance, lost their elections, they still received millions of votes collectively, with some races ending on razor-thin margins. The fact that many races between pro-democracy candidates and nasty neo-fascist candidates were so close is a major indictment of our entire electoral system, and the influence that big-money wields billionaires like Peter Thiel have created a deep cynicism about our democracy, which they continue to exploit for their economic benefit, propping up faux-populous politicians who seek to distract us from their ultimate agenda, tax cuts for the rich, and the continued transfer of wealth from working people into the pockets of the top 1%. Now be warned, as long as billionaires can manipulate elections like this, our democracy, our rights, and our livelihoods will be on the line. We must continue our fight to vanquish the corrupting influence of big-money on our system.