Election campaign spending in the United States reached a substantial scale during the 2023–2024 federal cycle. The Federal Election Commission (FEC) recorded billions of dollars in receipts and disbursements by candidates, parties and political action committees, while OpenSecrets estimated $14.8 billion spent across all federal elections in 2024.
Contents
- Federal election finance at a glance
- Presidential and congressional candidates
- Senate and House campaign figures
- Political party receipts and spending
- PACs and independent expenditure groups
- Outside spending and digital advertising
- Large donors and the 2024 money landscape
Federal election finance at a glance
The FEC’s 24-Month Campaign Activity summary covers January 1, 2023 through December 31, 2024. Its figures separate candidates, party committees and PACs, so they should not be added together as a single measure of unique spending: money can move between organizations and categories.
| FEC category, 2023–2024 | Receipts | Disbursements or spending |
|---|---|---|
| Presidential candidates | $2.0120 billion | $1.7967 billion |
| Congressional candidates | $3.8015 billion | $3.7042 billion |
| Political party committees | $2.7461 billion | $2.6463 billion |
| PACs | $15.7441 billion | $15.5203 billion |
| Independent expenditures | — | $4.4265 billion |
| Electioneering communications | — | $11.3 million |
| Communication costs | — | $39.7 million |
The FEC counted 109 individuals who filed campaign finance reports for the 2024 presidential election by December 31, 2024. Across those presidential candidates, the summary described about $2.0 billion raised and about $1.8 billion spent during the two-year cycle. Combined cash-on-hand was $139 million, while combined debt was $49.3 million.
Congressional activity involved 2,152 candidate committees in the 2024 cycle table. Congressional candidates held $580.3 million in cash-on-hand and had $475.4 million in debts owed as of December 31, 2024. These balance figures are end-of-period measures, not additional spending during the cycle.
Presidential and congressional candidates
Presidential candidates reported $2.0120 billion in receipts for the 2023–2024 cycle and $1.7967 billion in disbursements, according to the FEC 24-Month Campaign Activity summary. Receipts describe money reported as received; disbursements describe money reported as paid out. The distinction matters because funds remaining at the end of the period appear in cash-on-hand rather than as additional disbursements.
Congressional candidates reported $3.8015 billion in receipts and $3.7042 billion in disbursements for the same cycle. Their totals cover both Senate and House candidate committees. The FEC’s congressional category therefore provides a broad view of federal legislative campaigns, while the chamber-level figures below show how that activity was distributed.
The FEC recorded $475.4 million in congressional candidate debts as of December 31, 2024, alongside $580.3 million in cash-on-hand. The number of committees included was 2,152. These are reporting-unit statistics: they describe committees in the FEC table rather than a count of individual candidates who necessarily ran a full two-year campaign.
The FEC also reported $452.8 million in PAC contributions to federal candidates during 2023–2024. That amount is a contribution flow into candidate campaigns and should be kept distinct from the much larger total receipts reported by all PACs, which include activity beyond direct candidate contributions.
Senate and House campaign figures
Senate candidates reported $1.5 billion in total receipts during 2023–2024, according to the FEC summary. Senate candidates reported $208.4 million in debts and $90.6 million in cash-on-hand. The debt and cash figures are associated with the end of the reporting period, whereas total receipts cover activity over the cycle.
House candidates reported $2.3 billion in total receipts and $2.2 billion in disbursements for 2023–2024. The FEC reported $267 million in House candidate debts and $489.7 million in House candidate cash-on-hand. Because receipts and disbursements measure activity over time but debt and cash-on-hand are balance measures, these figures answer different questions about campaign finance.
| Candidate group | Cycle receipts | Cycle disbursements | End-period cash-on-hand | End-period debt |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Senate candidates | $1.5 billion | Not stated in supplied FEC figure | $90.6 million | $208.4 million |
| House candidates | $2.3 billion | $2.2 billion | $489.7 million | $267 million |
The FEC’s broader congressional totals were $3.8015 billion in receipts and $3.7042 billion in disbursements. The Senate and House receipt figures together are presented at rounded precision, so they should not be treated as a replacement for the more precise overall congressional totals.
Political party receipts and spending
National, state and local party committees reported $2.7 billion in federal-funds receipts and $2.6 billion in disbursements as of December 31, 2024, in the FEC summary. They reported $76 million in debts and $175.1 million in cash-on-hand. The FEC’s separate political-party category reported $2.7461 billion in receipts and $2.6463 billion in disbursements for the 2023–2024 cycle.
Across the listed federal party accounts, Democratic party committees reported $1.6142 billion in receipts and $1.5592 billion in disbursements. Republican party committees reported $1.1211 billion in receipts and $1.0769 billion in disbursements. Other party committees reported $10.9 million in receipts, $10.2 million in disbursements and $1.8 million in cash-on-hand.
Individuals supplied $672.9 million to Democratic party committees and $514 million to Republican party committees, according to the FEC summary. PACs and other political committees supplied $108.2 million to Democratic party committees and $102.5 million to Republican party committees.
Party fundraising also appeared in several segregated accounts. National party committee segregated accounts reported $446 million in receipts between January 1, 2023 and December 31, 2024. Democratic national party committee segregated accounts received $230.3 million, compared with $215.4 million for Republican national party committee segregated accounts. Recount accounts reported $207.7 million, headquarters accounts reported $194 million and convention accounts reported $44.3 million in receipts.
OpenSecrets reported a different presentation of the 2024 party fundraising picture: $6.4 billion for Democrats and $5.9 billion for Republicans. That estimate is from the OpenSecrets 2024 Annual Report and uses its own coverage and methodology, so it should not be read as a direct restatement of the FEC account totals.
PACs and independent expenditure groups
PAC activity was the largest broad category in the FEC summary. PACs reported $15.7441 billion in receipts and $15.5203 billion in disbursements during 2023–2024. The FEC counted 9,233 federal PACs reporting activity in the cycle.
Within that universe, independent expenditure-only political committees reported $5.0969 billion in receipts. Committees with non-contribution accounts reported $8.0880 billion in receipts, and leadership PACs reported $857.4 million. These are overlapping or differently defined reporting categories within the FEC’s campaign-finance framework, so the figures are not a simple list of non-overlapping spending pots.
The FEC recorded $4.4265 billion in independent expenditures during the cycle. It also recorded $11.3 million in electioneering communications and $39.7 million in communication costs. These measures focus on particular types of political communication rather than all spending by every organization involved in federal elections.
OpenSecrets estimated outside spending on 2024 federal elections at $4.46 billion, including nearly $2.1 billion on the 2024 presidential race. OpenSecrets reported that outside spending was up 51% from 2020. The FEC independent-expenditure total and the OpenSecrets outside-spending estimate are close in scale but are not identical measures; each source’s label and methodology should be retained.
Outside spending and digital advertising
OpenSecrets reported that political advertisers spent $1.9 billion on online ads for the 2024 election across Meta, Google, Snap and X. This is a platform-specific digital advertising estimate, not a measure of all campaign communications or total federal election spending.
OpenSecrets reported that independent political committees received more than $1.3 billion from shell companies and dark money groups during the 2024 cycle. For comparison, the organization reported $617 million from groups with anonymous donors in the 2022 midterm cycle and $653 million in the 2020 presidential cycle. It reported less than $71.7 million from shell companies and dark money groups in the 2016 election.
OpenSecrets also reported that outside groups spent about $1.14 billion on the 2020 presidential race. The organization’s 2024 estimate of nearly $2.1 billion for outside spending on the presidential race therefore describes a later cycle and a different reported level. The figures should be compared as source estimates for their named cycles, not treated as a continuous annual series.
A large share of this activity was concentrated among a limited number of organizations. OpenSecrets said Future Forward USA PAC spent about $509.5 million on the presidential race. MAGA Inc. spent $393 million supporting Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. America PAC spent $259 million on the 2024 election, and more than 90% of America PAC’s spending went toward the presidential race.
OpenSecrets said Future Forward USA Action left the source of nearly $230.8 million of Future Forward’s funds unknown. The report also said Mike Bloomberg gave $50 million to Future Forward’s nonprofit arm and another $19 million to the hybrid PAC during the cycle.
Large donors and the 2024 money landscape
OpenSecrets reported that Elon Musk personally put about $249.8 million into America PAC, including $118.6 million in October alone. Timothy Mellon gave $150 million to MAGA Inc. These figures identify reported contributions described in the OpenSecrets 2024 Annual Report; they do not represent the total receipts or spending of the recipient organizations.
Dustin Moskovitz contributed to Future Forward USA eight times between August 28 and October 22, 2024. OpenSecrets said those gifts ranged from $2 million to $10 million and totaled $50 million. The dates are important because the figures describe a defined period of contributions rather than an undated lifetime total.
Taken together, the FEC and OpenSecrets figures show several layers of election finance: candidate committees reported billions in receipts, parties reported billions in federal funds, PACs reported more than $15 billion in receipts, and outside spending reached billions of dollars under OpenSecrets’ estimate. The specific totals remain dependent on the source definition, reporting category and measurement period attached to each statistic.