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  • FEC Record: Statistics

FEC summarizes first year of campaign activity for 2015-2016 election cycle

April 6, 2016

Presidential candidates raised $442.7 million and spent $319.3 million during the first 12 months of the 2015-2016 election cycle, according to an analysis by the Federal Election Commission.

Graphic of money by Category Graphic of money by group

Click on images to enlarge.

The 82 candidates with White House bids also reported a total of $20.5 million in debts and $127.6 million in cash on hand in 2015,based on the Commission''s study, which calculated information from all campaign finance reports filed with the agency covering activity between January 1 and December 31, 2015.

Congressional candidates also received $601.5 million and disbursed $286.6 million in 2015. The 122 candidates running for Senate in 2016 – as well as in the 2015 special elections – reported total receipts of $213.1 million, disbursements of $85.9 million, debts of $8.9 million and cash-on-hand of $222.2 million during the period.

Meanwhile, 926 candidates running for the House of Representatives in 2016 and last year’s special elections reported combined total receipts of $388.4 million, disbursements of $200.7 million, debts of $44 million and cash-on-hand of $368.1 million in 2015.

National, state and local political party committees reported combined total receipts of $481.9 million in federal funds for the one-year period, disbursements of $383.8 million, debts of $21.4 million, and cash-on-hand of $124.6 million as of December 31, 2015.

Based on reports filed with the Commission for 2015, 7,223 federal PACs reported total receipts of $1.4 billion, disbursements of $1.1 billion, debts of $23.5 million, and combined cash-on-hand of $824.3 million. Contributions by PACs to presidential and congressional candidates seeking office in the 2015-2016 election cycle totaled $1.3 million and $192.9 million, respectively, as of December 31, 2015.

All independent expenditures reported to the Commission in 2015 in connection with presidential and congressional elections in the 2015-2016 election cycle totaled $113.5 million.

Independent Expenditure-Only Political Committees accounted for $102.9 million of all independent expenditures disclosed to the Commission, Committees with Non-Contribution Accounts reported $2.8 million, and other PACs reported $2.2 million. Independent expenditures made by persons other than political committees totaled $5.2 million, and party committees reported independent expenditures totaling $407,564.

Data summary tables for reports submitted to the Commission through December 31, 2015 are listed below for:

Resources: