Glossary

campaign-finance terms + FEC codes, in plain English

The terms and codes used across the site, defined. Coded values on entity pages link back to their entries.

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Terms

campaign-finance concepts

Term	Definition
Attestation	A recorded statement of a figure's provenance and coverage -- what was measured, from which source, as of when. Four states exist on this site. 'Not externally verified' (live today, on virtually all figures): these figures come from our own pipeline and have not yet been cross-checked against an authoritative external total (e.g. the FEC's own published summaries) -- a provenance / confidence label, not an error; the figures are still the same ones the source system holds. 'Partial coverage' (designed, not yet live): measured and found below full coverage; shows the measured percentage. 'Externally verified complete' (designed, not yet live): fully covered and cross-checked against an external total. 'Provenance unknown': no attestation metadata is present at all -- distinct from 'not externally verified,' which means attestation exists and says the check has not happened yet.
Bundler	A person who gathers many individuals' contributions and delivers them together to a campaign, amplifying their influence.
CVAP	Citizen voting-age population — the count of citizens 18+, the denominator for many demographic and turnout measures.
Conduit / earmarked contribution	A contribution routed through an intermediary (e.g. a platform like ActBlue or WinRed) to a specified recipient; the true giver is the individual, not the conduit.
Contribution	Money or anything of value given to a committee to influence a federal election. Subject to source and amount limits.
Contribution limit	The maximum amount a source may give to a committee per election, set by law and indexed for inflation.
Coordinated expenditure	Spending made in cooperation with a candidate or party; treated as a contribution and subject to limits.
Crossover	The gap between how a place voted and how it registers by party — a result running more one way than its registration.
Dark money	Election spending by groups (often 501(c)(4) nonprofits) that are not required to disclose their donors.
Disbursement	Money a committee spends — payments to vendors, staff, transfers, or refunds.
Donor-geo coverage	What share of itemized individual-donor giving has an address precise enough to place on a map. As of 2026-08-29: about 15% of donor money and 15% of donors, concentrated in 9 states (AK, AL, AR, AZ, CO, CT, DC, DE, FL) — every other state, including the largest donor states (CA, NY, TX), currently has zero geocoded rows. A blank state on the map means 'not yet geocoded,' never 'no donors here.' Coverage grows over time as more addresses are geocoded; this figure is a point-in-time snapshot, not a live count.
Election cycle	The two-year period (odd year through the next even-year general) over which federal campaign activity is measured.
Electioneering communication	A broadcast ad that names a federal candidate near an election without expressly telling viewers how to vote.
Filing coverage	Campaign-finance filings are complete through the most recently closed election cycle; the current cycle's filings are still being submitted to the FEC and ingested, so recent figures undercount until that cycle closes.
Hybrid (Carey) PAC	A committee with two accounts — one that contributes to candidates under normal limits, and a separate account that spends independently with no limit.
In-kind contribution	A non-cash contribution (goods or services) valued at fair-market cost and counted against contribution limits.
Independent expenditure (IE)	Spending that expressly supports or opposes a candidate but is not coordinated with any campaign. Unlimited, but must be reported.
Joint fundraising committee (JFC)	A committee that raises money on behalf of two or more committees and splits the proceeds by a written formula.
Leadership PAC	A PAC sponsored by a candidate or officeholder that is separate from their own campaign committee, often used to support other candidates.
PAC	Political action committee — a group that raises money to give to candidates or spend on elections.
Partisan lean	How much more Democratic or Republican a place voted than a chosen baseline, e.g. D+29 or R+12.
Pre-recompute mirror	Serving tier: describes how far a figure has moved from the raw filing toward a fully reconciled record. 'Pre-recompute mirror' (live today, on virtually all figures) is a faithful, verbatim mirror of the data as filed at the source, before cross-source entity resolution and reconciliation -- accurate to the filing, not yet reconciled across sources. 'Internal checks pass; completeness not externally proven' (designed, not yet live) has passed the pipeline's own consistency checks, but completeness has not been proven against an outside source. 'Externally verified' (designed, not yet live) has been checked against an authoritative external total. A fourth code value exists in the underlying data model with no confirmed live rows; it is deliberately left undefined here pending a data-team review (electinfo/enterprise#2678).
Principal campaign committee	The single committee a candidate designates to run their own campaign.
RDH precinct	A precinct boundary + election-result file from the Redistricting Data Hub, the basis for precinct-level partisan lean.
Receipt	Money a committee takes in — contributions, transfers, loans, or other income.
Refund	Money a committee returns to a contributor — an excessive, prohibited, or unwanted contribution.
Super PAC	An independent-expenditure-only committee: it may raise and spend unlimited sums to support or oppose candidates, but may not contribute to or coordinate with them.
Transfer	Money moved between affiliated committees (e.g. a party's national and state accounts).
Turnout	The share of registered (or eligible) voters who cast a ballot in a given election.
Vendor	A firm a committee pays for services — media, consulting, mail, fundraising, polling, and the like.
Vintage	The as-of date of this data snapshot -- when the underlying records were last refreshed from the source (the warehouse snapshot shown in the header). Figures are 'as of' their vintage.
k-anonymity	A privacy floor: an aggregate is only shown if at least k people fall in the cell, so no individual can be singled out.

Data variables

measures on the map & analyze surfaces — each links to its source

Elections

Source: Redistricting Data Hub — precinct election returns (VEST) · methodology

Variable	Definition
Partisan lean lean	How D or R the two-party vote ran (D-positive); a precomputed margin, not a raw count.
Vote margin margin	Democratic votes minus Republican votes — an absolute count, not a share.
Turnout turnout	Ballots cast as a share of registered voters.
Total votes votes_total	Total votes cast in the contest.
Precincts precinct_count	Number of precincts with reported returns.

Registration

Source: Redistricting Data Hub — voter file / registration rollups · methodology

Variable	Definition
Registered voters reg_total	Total registered voters (available in every state).
Registration lean reg_lean	(Dem − Rep registrants) ÷ total. Party registration only — ~29 states record it.
Democratic registration share reg_dem_share	Dem registrants ÷ total. Party-registration states only.
Republican registration share reg_rep_share	Rep registrants ÷ total. Party-registration states only.
Crossover crossover	Electoral lean minus registration lean — how much more Democratic the RESULT ran than the registration.

Demographics — CVAP

Source: U.S. Census — Citizen Voting-Age Population Special Tabulation · methodology

Variable	Definition
Citizen voting-age population cvap_total	Citizens age 18+ — the voting-eligible population.
CVAP share of population cvap_share	Citizen voting-age population ÷ total population.
Hispanic CVAP share cvap_hispanic	Hispanic citizens 18+ ÷ total CVAP.
Black CVAP share cvap_black	Black citizens 18+ ÷ total CVAP.
Non-white CVAP share cvap_nonwhite	1 − (white-alone citizens 18+ ÷ total CVAP).

Demographics — Population

Source: U.S. Census — Decennial Census (2020, PL 94-171) · methodology

Variable	Definition
Total population pop	Total resident population (2020 enumeration).
Hispanic population share pop_hispanic	Hispanic residents ÷ total population.
Non-white population share pop_nonwhite	1 − (white-alone residents ÷ total population).

Socioeconomic (ACS)

Source: U.S. Census — American Community Survey (5-year) · methodology

Variable	Definition
Median household income median_household_income	Median annual household income (ACS estimate).
Poverty rate poverty_rate	Share of people below the federal poverty line.
Bachelor's degree or higher bachelors_plus_pct	Share of adults 25+ with a bachelor's degree or more.
Median gross rent median_gross_rent	Median monthly gross rent.
Health-insured insured_pct	Share of people with health insurance coverage.

Entities

the cast & how they lock together

These are the pieces of this world and how money and elections connect them. An Agent is anything the money graph tracks — a Person, a Committee, or an Organization. A Candidate is not a separate kind of thing: it is a Role a Person holds while running for a seat. A Vendor is not a separate kind either — it is an Organization in the function of being paid by a committee. Money moves between these kinds without double-counting: transfers out of a joint fundraising committee are not counted again as the receiving committees’ receipts, and state (TEC) and federal (FEC) figures are stacked and labeled, never silently merged.

Agent

The supertype — any actor the money graph tracks: a Person, a Committee, or an Organization.

Supertype of Person · Committee · Organization

Person People →

A single human being, tracked across every Role they hold — candidate, officer, donor — and across jurisdictions. The Person is the stable identity; the Roles change.

A kind of Agent · holds Roles (Candidate, Officer, Bundler)

Role

A hat a Person wears — Candidate, Officer, Bundler. A Role is not a separate entity; the same Person can hold many Roles over time and across seats.

Held by a Person · e.g. Candidate, Officer, Bundler

Candidate Candidates →

A Role of a Person: someone running for a specific seat in a specific cycle. Not a fourth kind of entity — the Person is the identity, Candidate is one of their Roles.

A Role of a Person · runs for a seat in a Place

Committee Committees →

An FEC-registered money vehicle — a campaign committee, PAC, party committee or joint fundraising committee — that raises and spends. (‘Committee type’ below is the FEC letter code.)

A kind of Agent · includes Conduits and JFCs

Organization

A company or group that is not an FEC committee — an employer, a consulting firm, a union. Organizations transact with committees; a Vendor is an Organization in a particular function.

A kind of Agent · acts as a Vendor when paid by a Committee

Vendor Vendors →

A FUNCTION of an Organization: a firm in its role as a paid recipient of committee disbursements — media, consulting, printing. Not a separate kind of entity; the Organization is the identity, Vendor is what it is doing.

A function of an Organization · paid by Committees

Place States →

A geography — nation, state, district, county, precinct. Places NEST inside one another, and a district number is not a stable identity across redistricting plans.

Nests · a seat’s jurisdiction · not identity across plans

Bundler

An operational Role: a person who gathers other people’s contributions and delivers them together. A Role, not an entity — and NOT the same as a conduit.

A Role of a Person · ≠ Conduit

Officer

A Role: a Person who holds a named position — treasurer, custodian — on a Committee.

A Role of a Person · on a Committee

Conduit

A committee that passes earmarked contributions through to recipients — ActBlue, WinRed. A conduit is a registered Committee, NOT a bundler (which is an operational Role).

A kind of Committee · ≠ Bundler

Joint fundraising committee (JFC)

A committee that raises money jointly for several committees, then allocates it. Its transfers out are not double-counted against the receiving committees’ receipts.

A kind of Committee · allocates to several

Committee type

FEC code

Code	Means	Description
C	Communication cost	A corporation/union/group's cost to communicate with its restricted class.
D	Delegate committee	Organized to support delegates to a presidential nominating convention.
E	Electioneering communication	Files electioneering communications near an election.
H	House campaign	A candidate committee for a U.S. House campaign.
I	Independent-expenditure filer	A person/group (not a committee) filing independent expenditures.
N	PAC — nonqualified	A PAC not yet qualified (under 6 months, or 50 contributors / 5 candidates).
O	Super PAC (IE-only)	Independent-expenditure-only; unlimited sums, no candidate contributions.
P	Presidential campaign	A candidate committee for a U.S. Presidential campaign.
Q	PAC — qualified	A qualified PAC (6+ months, 50+ contributors, giving to 5+ candidates).
S	Senate campaign	A candidate committee for a U.S. Senate campaign.
U	Single-candidate IE committee	An independent-expenditure-only committee active for a single candidate.
V	Hybrid PAC — nonqualified	A hybrid (Carey) PAC with a non-contribution account, not yet qualified.
W	Hybrid PAC — qualified	A qualified hybrid (Carey) PAC with a non-contribution account.
X	Party — nonqualified	A party committee not yet qualified.
Y	Party — qualified	A qualified party committee — national, state, or local.
Z	National party nonfederal	A national party committee's nonfederal (soft-money) account.

Committee designation

FEC code

Code	Means	Description
A	Authorized	Authorized by a candidate, but not the principal campaign committee.
B	Lobbyist/registrant PAC	A PAC established or controlled by a lobbyist or registrant.
D	Leadership PAC	Sponsored by a candidate or officeholder, separate from their campaign.
J	Joint fundraising	Raises money on behalf of two or more committees.
P	Principal campaign committee	The candidate's principal campaign committee.
U	Unauthorized	Not authorized by any candidate — e.g. a traditional PAC or party committee.

Office

FEC code

Code	Means	Description
H	House	U.S. House of Representatives.
P	President	President of the United States.
S	Senate	U.S. Senate.

Incumbent / challenger status

FEC code

Code	Means	Description
C	Challenger	Challenging a sitting incumbent.
I	Incumbent	The current officeholder seeking re-election.
O	Open seat	Running for a seat with no incumbent in the race.

Disbursement category

FEC code

Code	Means	Description
001	Administrative / overhead	Administrative/salary/overhead expenses (e.g., rent, staff salaries, postage, office supplies, equipment, furniture, ballot access fees, petition drives, party fees and legal and accounting expenses).
002	Travel	Travel expenses, including travel reimbursement (e.g., commercial carrier tickets; reimbursements for use of private vehicles; advance payments for use of corporate aircraft; lodging and meal expenses incurred during travel).
003	Fundraising & solicitation	Solicitation and fundraising expenses (e.g., costs for direct mail solicitations and fundraising events including printing, mailing lists, consultant fees, call lists, invitations, catering costs and room rental).
004	Advertising	Advertising expenses, including general public political advertising (e.g., purchases of radio/television broadcast/cable time, print advertisements and related production costs).
005	Polling	Polling expenses.
006	Campaign materials	Campaign materials (e.g., buttons, bumper stickers, brochures, mass mailings, pens, posters, balloons).
007	Campaign events	Campaign event expenses (e.g., costs associated with candidate appearances, campaign rallies, town meetings, phone banks, including catering costs, door-to-door get-out-the-vote efforts and driving voters to the polls).
008	Transfers	Transfers (e.g., to other authorized committees of the same candidate).
009	Loan repayments	Loan repayments (e.g., repayments of loans made/guaranteed by the candidate or other person).
010	Contribution refunds	Refunds of contributions (e.g., contribution refunds to individuals/persons, political party committees or other political committees).
011	Political contributions	Political contributions (e.g., contributions to other federal candidates and committees, donations to nonfederal candidates and committees).
012	Donations	Donations (e.g., donations to charitable or civic organizations).
101	Non-allocable expenses (presidential)	Expenses that are not allocable.
102	Media (presidential)	Media expenditures.
103	Campaign materials (presidential)	Expenditures for mass mailings and other campaign materials (e.g., buttons, bumper stickers, brochures, mass mailings, pens, posters, balloons).
104	State-office overhead (presidential)	Overhead expenditures of state offices and their facilities (e.g., rent, staff salaries, postage, office supplies, equipment, furniture, ballot access fees, petition drives, party fees and legal and accounting expenses).
105	Telephone programs (presidential)	Expenditures for special telephone programs.
106	Polling (presidential)	Public opinion poll expenditures.
107	Fundraising (presidential)	Fundraising expenditures (e.g., costs for direct mail solicitations and fundraising events including printing, mailing lists, consultant fees, call lists, invitations, catering costs and room rental).

Sources & methodology

where the data comes from

Every variable on the site traces to one of these sources. Public sources are shown to everyone; credentialed sources (commercial voter files) are available to entitled organizations.

Source	What it is	Access
U.S. Census — American Community Survey (5-year)	Rolling 5-year survey estimates: income, education, housing, commute, insurance — with margins of error.	public
U.S. Census — Decennial Census (2020, PL 94-171)	The constitutionally-mandated full enumeration; total population and population by race/ethnicity.	public
U.S. Census — Citizen Voting-Age Population Special Tabulation	ACS-derived special tab of citizens 18+ by race/ethnicity — the denominator for voting-eligibility analysis.	public
Federal Election Commission — bulk data & filings	Official federal campaign-finance disclosure: candidates, committees, receipts, disbursements.	public
Redistricting Data Hub — precinct election returns (VEST)	Precinct-level certified election results, standardized and geocoded to precinct boundaries.	public
Redistricting Data Hub — voter file / registration rollups	State voter-file registration aggregates (party registration where states record it; totals elsewhere).	public
Civitech — voter file	Commercial national voter file. Credentialed: available to entitled organizations (see access).	credentialed
Catalist — voter file & models	Commercial national voter file and modeled scores. Credentialed: available to entitled organizations.	credentialed
Political Gravity — voter file	Commercial voter file. Credentialed: available to entitled organizations.	credentialed