FEC Raises Individual Federal Contribution Limits for 2025-2026 Election Cycle

January 30, 2025

As published in the Federal Register on January 30, 2025, the Federal Election Commission (FEC) has followed the statutory dictates and raised the federal individual contribution limits to account for inflation. The new contribution limits are as follows:

• Individual contribution limit to federal candidates, per election: Raised from $3,300 to $3,500
• Individual contributions to the main account of a national political party committee, per calendar year: Raised from $41,300 to $44,300.

This FEC action also statutorily increases the limits for individual contributions to the other accounts of the national party committees, which are the building account and the legal account for all six national party committees and the convention account for the DNC and RNC. The individual contribution limit for these accounts has increased from $123,900 to $132,900 per calendar year.

The FEC also raised some other non-individual contributions, such as the limit on contributions from certain political party committees to Senate candidates. For the per-election contribution limits, the primary and general election are considered separate elections, and some states have separate runoff elections or conventions that also count as separate elections.

Note that the contribution limit applicable to contributions from individuals to federal PACs is not indexed for inflation and remains at $5,000 per calendar year. Moreover, the contribution limit for contributions from federal multicandidate PACs to federal candidates also remains at $5,000 per election.

Contributions to nonfederal candidates and committees are not affected by the FEC’s actions and vary by jurisdiction along with special reporting, pay-to-play, lobbying, and/or other rules.

For more information, please contact Wiley’s Election Law & Government Ethics practice.