The FEC Has Effectively Been Shut Down for More Than 200 Days

The de facto “shutdown” at the Federal Election Commission has officially dragged on for more than 200 days.

Since April 30, the FEC has been unable to investigate complaints, issue new rules or advisory opinions, hold public meetings, conduct audits and fine political committees that run afoul of the law. The departure of the last remaining Republican commissioner, Trey Trainor, last month left the two remaining Democrats, Shana Broussard and Dara Lindenbaum, unable to carry out even administrative matters like scheduling and canceling public meetings

Campaigns for the 2026 midterm elections are ramping up, but neither Congress nor the White House appear poised to address this this year.

“Reconstituting a quorum of commissioners at the FEC hasn’t ranked as a top priority for Congress or the White House amid the other challenges and crises facing the government right now,” said Michael Beckel, senior research director at Issue One, a nonprofit that aims to reduce the influence of money in politics. “The country’s top campaign finance watchdog is limping along at a time when the American people deserve to have a fully functional independent agency ensuring all campaign finance rules and regulations are followed.”

Trump has for months been sitting on three commissioner candidates recommended by congressional leaders, but none have been formally nominated. The White House — which did not respond to requests for comment — has floated getting the FEC back to its full operation in the first quarter of 2026, a source familiar told NOTUS.

But nothing is set in stone, and the government shutdown may have changed the calculus with another round of negotiations on the horizon. The delay has campaign finance watchdogs and lawyers, including former Republican commissioners, on edge as the 2026 midterms draw closer.

Lee Goodman, a former Republican FEC chair and a partner at Dhillon Law Group, told NOTUS that the lack of a quorum may have “a disproportionate negative impact on Republicans and conservatives,” whom he says are more often the subject of complaints from watchdog groups.

The FEC neither publishes nor verifies complaints that have been filed, making it impossible to confirm which political party is the subject of more complaints.

Ultimately, Goodman says, “the greatest downside to the absence of a quorum” is that it gives rise to more lawsuits.

Without a functioning FEC to field complaints, individuals and groups can sue the agency and seek direct enforcement. There were “close to 100 cases or so” when he left the agency, Trainor said, calling it one of his “biggest” concerns.

“While the courts are great at being an oversight backstop to the FEC, they are not good at the everyday callin’ balls and strikes of what’s going on in campaign-finance world, and so it really puts everybody in a really terrible position,” Trainor said.

Since leaving the FEC, Trainor has joined Dhillon Law Group as a partner and launched a bid for outgoing Rep. Chip Roy’s House seat. He said he’s also worried about the FEC’s inability to weigh in with legal guidance.

“I can say that as both a former commissioner who is practicing law … but also as a candidate myself, if there are questions that come up. It’s kind of the Wild West right now,” Trainor told NOTUS.

Congressional leaders recommended Republicans Andrew Woodson, a partner at Wiley Rein; Ashley Stow, who previously worked with Trainor at the FEC; and Democrat Jonathan Peterson, a lawyer at the Elias Law Group, for the posts, as NOTUS previously reported.

Broussard, who chairs the commission, emphasized the need to get the agency up and running ahead of the midterm elections.

“As we move closer to 2026, primaries and the eventual general election, it is paramount to a functioning democracy to restore a quorum to the Commission. The public, the candidates, and the committees are disadvantaged by an FEC that cannot fully perform its statutory mission,” Broussard texted NOTUS.

Without the agency functioning normally, watchdogs are sounding the alarms that elections cannot be properly regulated.

“The FEC is allowing a whole bunch of potentially harmful activity, just green-lighting that essentially by not having a quorum. And it’s not the FEC’s fault, to be clear. It’s the administration’s fault for not submitting nominations,” Aaron Scherb, a longtime ethics and democracy lobbyist, said.

Trainor pointed the finger at Democrats, and warned against the FEC becoming “a pawn in a larger game of funding the government.”

“The Democrats have been so unwilling to negotiate on everything, why give them something else to negotiate with?” Trainor, who Trump nominated to the FEC in 2017 but was not confirmed until 2020, said. “Why would you give them another piece to play with by putting in more nominees?”

This is the fourth time that the independent, six-commissioner agency has lost a quorum in its 50-year history. The first was in 2008, while the two most recent FEC shutdowns took place in the second half of President Donald Trump’s first term, from September 2019 to June 2020 and July to December 2020.

This White House is no stranger to the FEC. White House counsel David Warrington and deputy White House counsel Gary Lawkowski have both practiced at the agency, including as counsel to Trump’s presidential campaign. Lawkowski was previously counsel to Goodman and former commissioner Sean Cooksey, who left the FEC in January to serve as counsel to Vice President JD Vance.

Warrington and Lawkowski did not respond to requests for comment.

The agency is not entirely shuttered while it waits for Trump to nominate new commissioners.

Political committees are still required to file campaign finance reports with the agency, which makes them available to the public, even during the government shutdown. And last Thursday, the FEC said there would be a grace period for late filers once the agency is back to normal operation.

Campaign finance complaints can also still be filed while the FEC is dark, and the Department of Justice can investigate certain legal violations.

“But those seeking additional legal guidance from the FEC during the 2026 midterms will hear only crickets until the FEC regains a quorum,” Beckel said.