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This story was produced by the Oregon Journalism Project, a nonprofit newsroom covering the state.
Phil Knight has broken his own record for political spending. The 87-year-old Nike co-founder wrote a $3 million check to the Bring Balance to Salem PAC on Oct. 22, according to a new filing with the Oregon secretary of state.
Bring Balance was formed in 2021. The PAC spent nearly $5 million in 2022 and just over $5 million in 2024, all in support of Republican legislative candidates.
The new check eclipses the previous single contribution record, also set by Knight when he wrote $2 million checks to the same political action committee in both 2023 and 2024. The latest contribution came a couple of weeks before recent November election results that favored Democrats nationwide.
Knight is also trying to buck the typical midterm outcome, which tends to favor the party that lost the presidential race two years before, which, in 2026, will be Democrats. Pundits, including the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, currently expect a strong Democratic performance next year, although with a “low ceiling” for gains, due to the relatively small number of contested races.
In Salem, Democrats already hold supermajorities in both legislative chambers: 18-12 in the Senate and 37-23 in the House. Knight, whose contribution came during a period when contributions don’t have to be reported for 30 days (that time period shortens as Election Day approaches), hopes to reduce those majorities, although gerrymandering has left few of Oregon’s state legislative districts truly competitive.
For Knight, whose net worth Bloomberg pegs at $29.4 billion, $3 million is a trifle. But his willingness to spend early for 2026 raises the possibility he will also spend aggressively in the governor’s race. In the 2022 race, won by Democrat Tina Kotek, Knight contributed $3.75 million to former state Sen. Betsy Johnson (D-Scappoose), who ran as a nonaffiliated candidate, and he gave $1.5 million to now-state Sen. Christine Drazan (R-Canby), the 2022 GOP nominee and a declared candidate again for 2026.
With Knight’s contribution, Bring Balance to Salem now has $3.93 million in cash on hand.
