Washington, D.C.: Hacking Attempt Takes FEC Filing System Offline a Week Before Midterms

A hacking attempt against the Federal Election Commission has taken the agency's electronic filing system offline, cutting off campaign spending disclosures one week before the November 3 midterm elections. Reuters reported the attack on Tuesday, citing an email from an FEC filings officer to campaign compliance firms. The Daily Caller and Newsmax carried the same account, and the commission confirmed the outage in its own statements.

The filing system has been down since about 10 p.m. Eastern Time on Monday, according to an FEC status message. In the email seen by Reuters, the filings officer told compliance firms on Monday night: "We have a bad actor attempting to breach FEC systems. As a result, we've had to temporarily shut down our web facing services."

What the outage blocks

The FEC tracks the money raised and spent by candidates, parties and political committees, and its filing system is how that activity reaches the public. While it is down, organizations cannot file the 24-hour and 48-hour spending reports that disclose, almost in real time, how much political groups are spending on specific races in the closing days of a campaign. Earlier reports remain searchable on the FEC website, the commission said.

The shutdown also disrupted filings sent through commercial filing software, and the agency's FECfile+ application had problems as well, according to the FEC status page. The commission cannot extend filing deadlines, although its guidance says it may decline to pursue fines when circumstances beyond a filer's control prevent a submission.

"I've never seen this in 26 years," said Steven Mele, president and CEO at political finance compliance firm MBA Consulting Group, speaking to Reuters about the outage and the disclosures it will keep from the public until the system is repaired.

Fix under way, voting not affected

Around 8 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, a new FEC status message said the issue "has been identified and a fix is being implemented." A notice on the agency website said the filing system remained offline. In a statement, the FEC said: "At this time, the FEC's electronic filing system is currently offline and our IT staff are actively working to restore service." The commission has not named a suspected attacker and has not said whether any data was accessed. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the FBI both referred questions to the FEC.

The FEC does not run elections. It does not operate polling places, voting machines or ballot counting, and the outage should not affect voting on November 3, when all 435 House seats and about a third of the Senate are at stake and Republicans defend their majorities.

Record spending goes dark

The timing hits disclosure at its busiest point. The midterms are now the most expensive US election in history, with about $11.21 billion spent on advertising and future reservations so far, according to ad tracker AdImpact. That passes the previous record of $11.2 billion spent on all races in 2024, including $3.2 billion on the presidential race.

Super PACs and dark money groups have spent an average of over $50 million per day over the last week, said Brendan Glavin, research director at watchdog group OpenSecrets. Over $250 million in spending was reported on October 20 alone. "It's a big deal," Glavin said. "These are the key reports that tell us what is happening. In the last days of the election this is the only way for us to keep track of where the money's being spent."