Party money · FEC filings
Where the party money is moving
What the two parties' committees and their allied groups reported spending in House and Senate races, week by week, and what changed. Every figure is a filing, counted the same way for both parties.
No figures to show yet
Party-network spending figures are not available yet: no complete collection of FEC filings has finished.
This page fills in as soon as a complete collection of FEC filings is on file. How the figures are counted.
How the figures are counted
What is counted. Spending reported to the Federal Election Commission by the national House and Senate committees of each party and the outside groups tied to them, for the 2026 general election. Independent expenditures are counted by the day the ad was disseminated, in weeks that run Monday to Sunday, Eastern time. Refunds and corrections stay as filed, so a week can net below zero. Party-coordinated spending is reported on its own line because it is not split by primary or general election, and filings that do not yet say which election they are for are also shown on their own line, never added in.
What these figures are not. Independent-expenditure and coordinated filings are not ad reservations; reservations are announced, not spent, and are not counted here. Groups prepay their buys, so weekly figures are lumpy. A super PAC can take over from a party committee, and cheaper markets or a well-funded candidate change the math. The last two weeks fill in as 24-hour notices arrive. Station-file ad contracts are not part of this page yet.
Not a model input. The forecast does not use these figures. They are reported filings, shown beside it.
The definitions: complete weeks, status words, seat-rating bands, sources
When a week is complete. A week counts as complete from the Thursday after it ends, which allows for the 24-hour reports and the time the FEC takes to post them. Status words use complete weeks only. The current week is drawn as partial.
What the status words mean. Two-week totals smooth out prepaid buys. "Entered" means the network had reported under the active level before the last two complete weeks and reported at least the change level in them. "Went dark" means it reported at least the change level in the two weeks before, and under a tenth of the active level in each of the last two. "Increased" and "decreased" need a change of at least 1.5 times or at most one half, and at least the change level in dollars. Both parties use the same numbers:
The seat-rating bands. Each race is placed by the consensus of the published race ratings in force on Sept. 1, from each party's own point of view: Safe, Likely, Lean or Toss-up for that party, or "rated for the other party". A race with no rating that day is "not rated" and is never given one.
Where the numbers come from. Filings from the Federal Election Commission (fec.gov), collected several times a day. A figure is shown only from a collection that finished; if the latest one did not, the page shows the last complete one and says so.