This newsletter is brought to you by Neptune Ops, the AI-Native Influence Operating System.

We’re Cassandra Custis and Andrew Eldredge-Martin from GroundTruth AI. Cassandra’s background is in political research and polling, with a focus on race, public opinion, and political behavior. Drew’s background is in narrative intelligence, advertising and analytics. Together, we’re interested in which political messages break through on YouTube, who’s spreading them and what campaigns can learn as a result.

So this week, we’re taking a closer look at Georgia. Same Senate seat, same election, two very different stories.

More on that below, but first…

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Digital ad spending, by the numbers:

FWIW, U.S. political advertisers spent around $11.3 million on Facebook and Instagram ads last week. Here were the top ten spenders nationwide:

The story of this week across all platforms is new spending from major Republican war chests: Elon’s America PAC and Trump’s No Way Back PAC. We covered America PAC’s first wave of spending last week with its anti-socialist mobilization spots. This week, the first persuasion hits have started to come down on Google and CTV. Despicable as the ads may be, the bulk of spend hasn’t hit yet: we’re counting only $590k so far across Meta, Google, and CTV.

The good news? America PAC is mistrafficking all over the place. Turns out “move fast and break things” still doesn’t work in Washington politics.

Meanwhile, political advertisers spent around $26.2 million on Google and YouTube ads last week. These were the top ten spenders nationwide:

Musk and Trump may be the splashiest stories of the week, but the usual suspects still account for a large chunk of the action. Senate Leadership Fund, One Nation, and American Action Network made up 16% of all Google political spending. Narrow that down to House and Senate races, and their share jumps to 25%.

The Navajo County Dems are another spender of interest, dropping more than $2.1 million across all platforms. Most of that went into the Arizona governor’s race, dominated by this Spanish-language creative. The group was also a notable spender in the attorney general race and several legislative contests, including State Senate District 4.

On CTV platforms, U.S. political advertisers spent an estimated $56 million last week. Here were the top ten spenders nationwide:

While most eyes have been on the Senate race in the Lone Star State, incumbent Gov. Greg Abbott has built a huge spending lead over his opponent, State Rep. Gina Hinojosa. Abbott has consistently shown up in the top ten on several platforms in recent weeks and though Hinojosa did crack the top ten on Meta last week, her campaign was primarily focused on fundraising.

Over the past week, Abbott spent $7.1 million across all platforms, compared to just $383k from Hinojosa’s campaign. The gap is similarly stark looking back to the beginning of August: $21.7 million from Abbott vs. $1.5 million from Hinojosa.

…and lastly, on Snapchat, here’s YTD data for the top 10 spenders:

For the first time in a while, a major GOP persuasion spender has entered the Snapchat villa! While the affiliated Senate Leadership Fund has spent only $14k (as we covered last week), their 501(c)(4) has been considerably more active—enough to pass the left-aligned, perennial Snapchat spender Senate Majority PAC.

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Jon Ossoff is giving the internet exactly what it wants

What’s breaking through in Georgia

Georgia’s on our mind today, and FWIW, it should be on everyone’s. Jon Ossoff – the only Democratic senator defending a seat in a state Trump won in 2024 – is having a hell of a run, heading toward November with a nearly double-digit polling lead and a serious cash advantage. The latest polls have Ossoff up 52% to 43% over Republican Mike Collins and he’s also been a stellar fundraiser, outraising his opponent nearly 10-to-1 last quarter. He’s sitting on a reported $42 million cash on hand, nearly double what Democratic Senate hopefuls James Talarico and Roy Cooper have banked in Texas and North Carolina respectively.

But polling and fundraising tell only part of the story.

ClarifyAI helps turn thousands of YouTube videos into a clear picture of which narratives are breaking through and who’s driving them. We turned that lens on Georgia’s Senate race, assessing 3,765 videos with 70 million combined views across July and August. In short, Ossoff isn’t just winning YouTube, he’s winning ~~bigly~~ by a lot. He commands 87% of all views between the two candidates, and 85% of his views are positive. Collins pulls the other 13% and 86% of his view share comes from people dunking on him.

Ossoff gives people something to share

The positive content about Ossoff reinforces a consistent message: he has momentum, he’s doing his job in the Senate, and he’s willing to challenge President Trump and his administration. In our narrative analysis, content focused on his campaign strength and polling leads alone generated 35.7 million views, representing 58% of views across the Ossoff narratives we tracked. Other favorable narratives highlight his policy work, including healthcare, veterans’ issues and rural communities, along with his campaign skills and assertive questioning in Senate hearings.

The Senate hearing clips are especially useful because they give viewers something concrete to visualize. Ossoff asks a direct yes or no question. A Trump official dodges and stumbles through what should be a straightforward answer. It’s an easy clip people can pick up and run with.

Ossoff and his team treat Senate committee rooms as high-yield content studios designed for third-party creators, late-night hosts, and commentary channels to clip and monetize.

Ossoff’s positive content comes from a range of sources: news outlets like MSNBC and CNN, online political commentators, his own Senate and other campaign channels, and late-night television. Across those different creators, the basic story is the same: Ossoff is a candidate with momentum who is actively good at his job.

Narratives about his presidential potential were also picked up in our analysis. That’s not entirely surprising as Ossoff has already made it onto the likely long list of 2028 Democratic presidential nominee favorites in coverage from outlets like New York Times and the Washington Post. Which, okay, one election at a time.

Ossoff does face criticism and the data shows it. Negative narratives include opposition to his political positions and voting record, broader attacks on his candidacy and pushback on his continued criticism of the Trump administration. But those attacks are dwarfed by a much larger volume and reach of positive content.

Collins’ associations become the story

Collins is living in a different data set entirely. Political criticism and doubts about his Senate prospects generated 4.3 million views, representing 45% of views across the narratives we tracked about him. Other themes focus on his relationship with Trump, ethics and hiring concerns, political associations, and difficulty expanding his appeal beyond MAGA voters. Put together, it’s a portrait of a candidate with questionable electability and judgment.

In the study’s final week (August 24-31), accusations of racism and antisemitism made up 34% of views across both candidates, making it the largest single narrative of the period. The uptick coincided with news that yet another former Collins staffer had white nationalist ties and a trail of troubling social media posts.

And Ossoff actively pushed that narrative forward. At a previously planned stop in Macon, he used the new reporting to argue that Collins’s associations were disqualifying, not only for the Senate but for the office he already holds. His campaign turned that response into content for its own YouTube channel, while C-SPAN posted its own clip.

Creators carried the argument even further. Philip DeFranco, with 6.64 million subscribers, folded the staffer story, past controversies, Ossoff’s criticism and Collins’s responses into a broader news roundup that pulled 489,252 views. Political commentary channels gave the story dedicated treatment. TabithaSpeaksPolitics devoted an entire video to the company Collins keeps, while Jesse Dollemore built a 12-minute segment around Ossoff’s response. Those videos received 23,630 and 61,095 views, respectively.

Collins’s associations have become more than a campaign liability. They’ve become the story. Ossoff is using them to question whether Collins belongs in public office at all, and YouTube content is carrying and reinforcing that case.

What Democrats can learn from Georgia

We haven’t yet seen how Collins will respond to this latest barrage of negative content. But with videos about Ossoff drawing nearly 7x as many views in our study, Collins already faces an uphill battle to get his own narrative heard on YouTube.

For Ossoff, the task at hand is pretty straightforward: keep showing Georgians what he’s doing with the seat they gave him. Take clear positions, stand up for constituents, challenge a controversial administration when it matters. The positive narratives surrounding Ossoff on YouTube offer Democrats a lesson in giving people something concrete to support.

Voters need something they can point to and share, something that lets them say, “My senator does that.” Showing what you’re doing for the people you represent matters, especially when you’re asking them to believe that participating in politics is worthwhile.

We can’t say whether the attention Ossoff has generated translates into votes, but we can see how that attention builds a story about a candidate with support, conviction, and a willingness to fight.

If you want to delve further into the data on which narratives are driving the conversation around a competitive race, issue or organization, or you have a client who needs help breaking down negative narratives across the media ecosystem, reach out at info@groundtruthai.org to learn more!

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Jon Ossoff is giving the internet exactly…