Campaign Donations Explained: Limits, Laws and Disclosure

Reading

Federal campaign finance law rests on one distinction. Money given directly to candidates is capped by contribution limits, while money spent independently of candidates faces far fewer restrictions. Who may give, how much they may give, and how much the public can learn about them all depend on the type of donor and the type of group receiving the money. This reading traces how the rules developed, sets out the limits for the 2025 and 2026 election cycle, and explains what is disclosed, to whom, and when.

Two ideas drive the system. The first is the fear of quid pro quo corruption, an exchange of money for official favors, which the Supreme Court has treated as the main legitimate reason to restrict political money. The second is the First Amendment, which protects political speech, including spending money to spread a message. Most rules below are compromises between these ideas, and the balance has shifted over time. For how campaigns raise and spend money in practice, see our campaign funding explainer.

A century of rules

Federal limits began with corporations and widened slowly. The timeline below follows a Congressional Research Service chronology through 2003 and then adds later court rulings.

1907: The Tillman Act barred corporations from contributing to federal campaigns.
1925: The Federal Corrupt Practices Act extended the ban to anything of value and made both giving and accepting such contributions a crime.
1947: The Taft-Hartley Act barred labor unions from contributing in federal elections.
1971: The Federal Election Campaign Act required disclosure of large contributions and spending, banned contributions made in another person’s name and by government contractors, and let corporations and unions create a political action committee (PAC), a committee that pools donations to support candidates.
1974: Amendments passed after the Watergate scandal added limits on contributions and on campaign spending and created the Federal Election Commission (FEC).
1976: In Buckley v. Valeo, the Supreme Court upheld contribution limits and disclosure rules but struck down limits on spending that is not coordinated with a campaign, known as an independent expenditure, and on candidates’ own spending. It confined regulation largely to messages that expressly urge a vote for or against a candidate.
2002: The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act banned national parties from raising soft money, large donations outside federal limits and rules. That left hard money, funds raised under federal limits and reporting rules, as the main source. The law also regulated certain ads shortly before elections and raised the limits on direct gifts, tying them to inflation.
2003: McConnell v. FEC largely upheld the soft money ban and the new rule on pre-election ads.
2010: In Citizens United v. FEC, the Court held that corporations and unions may spend unlimited sums on independent expenditures. That year, in SpeechNow.org v. FEC, a federal appeals court held that groups making only independent expenditures may accept unlimited contributions. The result was the super PAC.
2014: In McCutcheon v. FEC, the Court struck down the aggregate limit, a cap on how much one person could give to all candidates and committees combined in a two-year cycle. Limits on gifts to any single recipient remained.
2026: On June 30, in NRSC v. FEC, the Court ruled 6-3 that limits on spending that parties make in coordination with their own candidates violate the First Amendment, according to Mayer Brown’s legal analysis. The majority said base contribution limits, disclosure laws and earmarking rules, which stop donors from using a middleman to give a named candidate more than the limit, already address the risk of circumvention. The three dissenting justices argued that those tools cannot prevent quid pro quo corruption.

Who can give, and how much

These federal limits apply to races for president, Senate and House. State and local races follow state law, which varies widely. The table shows the limits published by the Federal Election Commission for 2025 and 2026. Individual limits rise with inflation in odd-numbered years, while traditional PAC limits are fixed.

Federal contribution limits, 2025 to 2026
Giver	To a candidate, per election	To a national party, per year	To a traditional PAC, per year
Individual	$3,500	$44,300, plus $132,900 for each special account	$5,000
Established traditional PAC (multicandidate)	$5,000	$15,000, plus $45,000 for each special account	$5,000
National party committee	$5,000, plus up to $62,000 combined with its Senate committee for a Senate candidate	Unlimited transfers	$5,000
Corporation or union (treasury funds)	Banned	Banned	Banned

The special accounts fund party conventions, recounts and legal fights, and headquarters buildings. Smaller or newer PACs that do not qualify as multicandidate committees follow the individual limits.

Several groups sit outside the table. Candidates may spend unlimited personal money on their own campaigns. Corporations and labor unions may not give treasury funds to candidates or parties, but they may create a separate segregated fund, a PAC financed by voluntary contributions from a limited group such as employees or members. They may also give to super PACs. A super PAC can raise unlimited sums from individuals, corporations and unions and may spend without limit on independent expenditures, but it may not give to candidates or coordinate its spending with their campaigns.

Some sources are banned outright. Foreign nationals may not contribute, directly or indirectly, in any federal, state or local election, and federal contractors and national banks are also barred. Giving money in another person’s name is illegal, whether through a straw donor or an employer who reimburses staff for donations. Campaigns also may not accept more than $100 in cash from a single source.

Other democracies draw the lines differently. In Canada, only citizens and permanent residents may give to parties and candidates, corporations and unions are barred, and the yearly limit in 2021 was C$1,650 for each category of recipient, according to a Canadian law firm’s guide. That limit rises by C$25 a year, so today’s figure is higher.

What the public can see

Transparency depends on the type of group. The table summarizes the main tiers, and the paragraphs after it explain the details.

Disclosure by type of group
Group	What it reports	Which donors are named
Candidate campaigns, parties, traditional PACs, super PACs	Regular reports to the FEC, mostly quarterly	Donors giving more than $200 in total, with name, address, occupation and employer
Any group paying for independent expenditures	A report within 48 hours at $10,000, and within 24 hours at $1,000 in the final 20 days	Donors who gave more than $200 for the purpose of the spending, a rule the courts have partly rewritten
Groups running electioneering communications	A report once the ads cost more than $10,000 in a year	Donors of $1,000 or more, narrowed by an FEC rule to gifts made for the ads
Nonprofits such as 501(c)(4) groups	Only the specific political spending described above	Other donors generally stay private

Candidate campaigns, parties and traditional PACs file regular reports with the FEC. Any donor whose gifts add up to more than $200 is listed with name, address, occupation and employer, a step called itemization. Smaller gifts appear only as a combined total, though the donation platform ActBlue itemizes every federal gift it processes.

Outside groups face different rules. A group that pays for an independent expenditure must report it within 48 hours once its spending reaches $10,000, and within 24 hours for spending of $1,000 or more in the final 20 days before an election, according to the FEC’s reporting guidance. The group must certify, under penalty of perjury, that the spending was not coordinated with a campaign.

An electioneering communication is a broadcast, cable or satellite ad that names a federal candidate within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election. Anyone, including a corporation or union, must report such ads once they cost more than $10,000 in a year, and donors who gave $1,000 or more may have to be named. A Congressional Research Service summary explains that an FEC rule narrows this to donors who gave “for the purpose of furthering” the ads. It adds that an appeals court upheld that narrowing in 2016, while a district court in 2018 struck down a similar narrowing for independent expenditures. This article could not confirm how later appeals changed the 2018 ruling.

Ads must also say who paid. A disclaimer must name the payer and state whether a candidate approved the message, and television ads must show a written statement on screen.

The biggest gap in visibility involves nonprofits. A social welfare organization (501(c)(4)) may take part in politics as long as politics is not its main purpose, and it is generally not treated as a political committee. It names donors only when they gave for specific ads or spending, so most of its funding stays private. Political spending whose original donors stay hidden is called dark money. Super PAC donors are public, but a super PAC donor can itself be such a group, which hides the original source, as the Brennan Center notes in its Citizens United explainer.

Disclosure also depends on enforcement. The FEC needs four of its six commissioners to open investigations or issue advisory opinions. It lost that quorum in April 2025, and on Oct. 17, 2026 it had two members, both Democrats, with two Republican nominees still awaiting action. Existing laws and reporting rules remain on the books. Nominees need confirmation, a process we explain in how Senate confirmation works.

Congress has not changed the disclosure framework. Democratic sponsors reintroduced the DISCLOSE Act in March 2026. It would require groups spending more than $10,000 on elections to disclose donors who gave more than $10,000, and about 182 members of Congress had signed on, according to Rep. Chris Pappas’s office. The bill has not passed either chamber, and the sponsors note that earlier Senate efforts failed amid Republican opposition.

Where the debate stands

The free-speech and privacy case. The majority in NRSC v. FEC held that limiting party coordination burdens speech more than necessary. On disclosure, Trevor Burrus of the Cato Institute argues that donor privacy protects supporters from harassment and fear of speaking. He points to the Court’s 2021 ruling against California’s demand for charities’ donor lists. That case concerned charities, not campaign finance law, and its effect on disclosure rules for political groups has not been settled.

The transparency and equality case. The Brennan Center, a research group that favors tighter rules, argues that the Citizens United majority assumed independent spending would stay transparent and that this assumption failed. The NRSC dissenters made a related point: earmarking and disclosure rules cannot stop quid pro quo corruption.

Some points are settled: the limits in the table, the ban on direct corporate gifts to candidates, and the reporting thresholds above. Others remain contested: whether independent spending is truly independent, whether earmarking and disclosure rules are enough, and how to balance donor privacy against public knowledge. Proposals to overturn Citizens United by constitutional amendment are a separate and much harder route, described in our explainer on amending the Constitution. The Nov. 3 election is the first general election since the NRSC ruling, and the FEC has no quorum to act on complaints about it unless the Senate confirms its two nominees first.

Glossary

A contribution limit of $3,500 per election applies to an individual’s gift to a federal candidate.
Supporters say a contribution limit reduces the risk that one donor can buy influence.

Most campaign committees raise only hard money.
Because hard money must be reported, journalists can trace large donors.

soft money (noun): Large donations to parties that fall outside federal limits, which national parties have been barred from raising since 2002.
Translations: 不受限的政治捐款 | 規制外の政治資金 | 비규제 정치자금 | अनियमित राजनीतिक धन | أموال سياسية غير خاضعة للقيود | нерегулируемые политические пожертвования | dinero no regulado (“soft money”) | fonds non réglementés

Reformers argued that soft money let wealthy donors give far more than the law intended.
The 2002 reform law ended soft money at the national party level.

The Supreme Court struck down the aggregate limit in 2014.
Before that ruling, an aggregate limit stopped a donor from supporting every candidate in a party.

A union can create a political action committee (PAC) funded by its members.
A political action committee (PAC) must report its donors to the FEC.

The company paid to run its separate segregated fund, but employees chose whether to donate.
A separate segregated fund may give to candidates even though its parent company may not.

super PAC (noun): A committee that can raise and spend unlimited sums on independent political activity but cannot give to candidates or coordinate with them.
Translations: 超级政治行动委员会 | スーパーPAC | 슈퍼팩 | सुपर पीएसी | لجنة العمل السياسي الفائقة | суперпак | super PAC (comité de acción política independiente) | super PAC (comité d’action politique indépendant)

A donor gave $5 million to a super PAC that supports a Senate candidate.
A super PAC may run ads but must not coordinate with the campaign.

The group reported a $20,000 independent expenditure for television ads.
An independent expenditure loses that label if the campaign helps plan it.

A group that engages in coordination with a campaign can no longer call its spending independent.
Since 2026, coordination between a party and its own candidate is no longer capped.

A union that spends more than $10,000 on an electioneering communication must file a report.
The ad counted as an electioneering communication because it aired 40 days before the general election and named a candidate.

After itemization, a donor’s name and employer appear in the campaign’s public filing.
Gifts below the threshold escape itemization and appear only as a combined total.

The disclaimer at the end of the ad named the group that paid for it.
Viewers could not read the disclaimer because it flashed by too quickly.

Rules against earmarking stop a donor from using a party to exceed a candidate’s limit.
Investigators examined whether the party’s gift was earmarking in disguise.

The owner repaid his employees for their gifts, making each of them a straw donor.
Giving through a straw donor is illegal because it hides the real source of the money.

social welfare organization (501(c)(4)) (noun): A nonprofit that may engage in some politics and generally does not have to reveal its donors publicly.
Translations: 社会福利组织 | 社会福祉団体 | 사회복지 단체 | सामाजिक कल्याण संगठन | منظمة الرعاية الاجتماعية | организация социального благосостояния | organización de bienestar social | organisation de bien-être social

A social welfare organization (501(c)(4)) can run issue ads without listing all of its donors.
Critics say a social welfare organization (501(c)(4)) can hide who is really paying for politics.

Reporters struggled to trace the dark money behind the ads.
Supporters of privacy reject the label dark money and call it protected speech.

The Court has said that preventing quid pro quo corruption is the main reason to limit donations.
A donation alone is not quid pro quo corruption unless it is tied to an official act.

Without a quorum, the commission cannot open investigations.
The Senate must confirm two nominees before the agency regains a quorum.

Discussion Questions

Have you ever donated to a cause or a campaign? Why did you choose to?
Should there be a limit on how much one person can give to a candidate?
Is spending money a form of free speech?
Can large donations buy influence even without an explicit deal?
Should corporations and unions have the same political spending rights as individuals?
How independent can a super PAC be from the campaign it supports?
Should donors to political nonprofits be public, or is privacy more important?
Is a $200 reporting threshold too high, too low or about right?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of letting parties coordinate spending with their candidates?
What do you think of Canada’s rule banning corporate and union donations?
Why might a rule exist but go unenforced, and what can citizens do about it?
Imagine you are a lawmaker. Which one campaign finance rule would you change first, and why?

Campaign Donations Explained: Limits, History, Disclosure