FEC compliance settings

Campaign workspaces get an FEC Compliance page under Administration that controls how your donation form enforces federal contribution rules. It only appears for campaign-type organizations, and only owners and admins can change it. For what donors see on the donation form itself, and where compliance fields show up on a donation record, see Donation records.

Turning on contribution limits

Open Administration, then FEC Compliance. The Enforce contribution limits switch blocks a contribution once a donor's giving to a specific election exceeds your configured cap. Below it, set:

• Jurisdiction -- Federal, State, or Local. Per-election limit enforcement only applies to campaigns set to Federal; state and local jurisdictions record the setting but don't block contributions.
• Per-election limit (USD) -- the maximum one donor can give toward a single election. It defaults to $3,500, the individual federal per-candidate-per-election limit for the 2025-2026 cycle, but you can change it to match whatever limit applies to your race. The FEC adjusts this limit for inflation in odd-numbered years, so check the new figure at the start of each cycle.

If limits are on, your jurisdiction is federal, and your campaign has no election a gift could count toward (see below), the page shows a warning that no cap is currently being enforced -- add an election to close the gap.

Configuring your elections

Contribution limits are tracked per election, so add each election your campaign is in on the Elections page. Open it from Campaign Advisor, then Elections in the sidebar, or from the Elections link on the FEC Compliance page.

Owners and admins can manage elections, and so can anyone whose custom role includes the Set up and change the race, its elections, deadlines and vote goal permission (under Campaign race in the role editor; see Roles and permissions). Other team members don't see the page.

For each election, set:

• Stage -- Primary, Primary runoff, Convention, General, or General runoff. A primary runoff and a general runoff in the same year are separate elections, so add both if your race has both.
• Special election -- tick this for a special election held outside the regular schedule.
• Date -- the election date. The election's year comes from this date.
• Label (optional) -- a free-text name, for example "PA-07 General."

The page lists the elections in your current race, earliest first. Elections from races that are over appear underneath under Earlier races. Until your current race has an election, gifts count toward the most recent of those races that you won, lost or withdrew from. Archived races are never used.

If your last race is over (lost, won or withdrawn), the page tells you which election gifts count toward now. If you have no current race, adding an election starts a new one: the page asks you to confirm with Start a new race first, because gifts then count toward the new race's elections. Elections of earlier races can't be edited or deleted.

If an election shows Check the stage, it was entered as a runoff or special election before stages existed, and its stage is a best guess. Select Edit, choose the right stage, and save it; the mark goes away once you do.

You can edit an election at any time. Deleting one asks you to confirm first, and also deletes the deadlines and vote-goal settings stored with it. An election that already has contributions recorded against it can't be deleted.

A donor's contribution counts toward the next election in your current race, judged by the date where your campaign is, so a gift made late on election day counts toward that election. Once every election in the race has passed, gifts count toward the last one. After you record a loss, gifts count toward the election you lost. Elections listed under Earlier races are not used while your current race has elections. A donor's running total for an election is the sum of everything they've given toward it so far, including gifts your team records by hand: the Record donation form on a contact asks which election the gift counts toward (see Donation records).

What happens when a donor hits the limit

When contribution limits are enforced and a donation would push a donor over your per-election cap, the donation form rejects the charge and tells the donor their gift would exceed the federal per-election limit for the campaign, along with how much room they have left. No partial charge goes through.

Donor identification and attestations

Two more switches control what your donation form asks for:

• Require donor identification -- collects the donor's name, mailing address, occupation, and employer, which federal law requires once a donor's aggregate giving crosses $200.
• Require eligibility attestations -- adds three checkboxes confirming the donor is a U.S. citizen or lawfully admitted permanent resident, that the contribution comes from their own funds, and that it isn't corporate or foreign-national money.

Both are on by default. Turning either off removes the corresponding fields from your public donation form -- keep them on unless you have a specific reason not to collect that information.

Why this matters

Political committees face contribution rules that ordinary nonprofit or organizing donations don't. Configuring elections and limits once means every donation to your campaign is checked automatically, instead of your team manually reconciling donor totals against FEC limits after the fact. Keeping donor identification and attestations on gives your compliance filings the underlying data they need, collected at the moment of the gift rather than chased down afterward.