FEC Campaign Finance Scraper

Extract US federal campaign finance data from the OpenFEC API: candidates with total receipts and disbursements, committees with treasurer contacts, and individual contributions with donor name, employer, occupation, amount and date

3 data types candidates · committees · contributions

United States federal coverage

JSON / CSV / Excel output formats

What you get

This scraper pulls directly from the official Federal Election Commission OpenFEC API. Pick one of three data types with the Data type input:

Individual contributions (Schedule A)

Itemized receipts reported to the FEC. The single best source for donor lead lists and contribution research.

• contributorName, contributorFirstName, contributorLastName: the donor
• contributorEmployer: employer the donor reported
• contributorOccupation: occupation the donor reported
• contributorCity, contributorState, contributorZip: donor location
• contributionReceiptAmount: dollar amount of the contribution
• contributionReceiptDate: date the contribution was received
• contributorAggregateYtd: the donor's year-to-date total to this committee
• committeeId, committeeName, committeeType: the recipient committee
• candidateId, candidateName, candidateOffice: linked candidate where reported
• entityType, isIndividual: individual vs. organization
• electionType, fecElectionYear, receiptType: classification
• memoCode, memoText: filer memo
• twoYearTransactionPeriod, reportType, filingForm, imageNumber, pdfUrl: source filing
• url: link to the recipient committee page on FEC.gov

Candidates

Every federal candidate with their campaign finance totals.

• candidateId, name: candidate identity
• party, partyFull: party
• office, state, district, districtNumber: what they ran for
• incumbentChallenge: incumbent, challenger or open seat
• candidateStatus, electionYear, cycle: status and cycle
• receipts: total money raised
• disbursements: total money spent
• cashOnHandEndPeriod: cash on hand at period end
• debtsOwedByCommittee: outstanding debts
• individualItemizedContributions, otherPoliticalCommitteeContributions, transfersFromOtherAuthorizedCommittee: receipt breakdown
• hasRaisedFunds, coverageStartDate, coverageEndDate: coverage
• addressCity, addressState, addressZip: mailing address
• firstFileDate, lastFileDate: filing history
• url: link to the candidate page on FEC.gov

Committees

Registered political committees with their filing contacts.

• committeeId, name: committee identity
• committeeType, designation: type and designation
• party, partyFull, organizationType: classification
• treasurerName: committee treasurer
• designatedAgentName, designatedAgentPhone: designated agent contact
• state, candidateIds, filingFrequency: details
• firstFileDate, lastFileDate: filing history
• url: link to the committee page on FEC.gov

Every record also carries observedAt (when the scraper saw it) and error (null on success).

Who is it for

Use case	Who benefits
Build donor lead lists by employer, occupation or location	Fundraisers and political consultants
Track who funds a candidate or committee	Journalists and opposition researchers
Compare candidate receipts and disbursements	Analysts and political scientists
Find committee treasurers and filing contacts	Compliance and outreach teams
Feed federal campaign finance into a data warehouse	Data engineers

How to use

1. Choose a Data type: Individual contributions, Candidates or Committees.
2. (Recommended) Add your own free OpenFEC API key. The built-in DEMO_KEY works for testing but is rate limited to about 30 requests per hour. Get a free key in seconds at api.data.gov/signup.
3. Apply filters for your data type (for contributions: cycle, recipient committee, contributor state, employer, occupation, date and amount range; for candidates: office, state, party, election year; for committees: type, state, party).
4. Set Max Items and run. Records stream into the dataset as they are found and can be exported to JSON, CSV or Excel.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which country and time range does this cover? United States federal campaign finance, as reported to the Federal Election Commission. Contribution data goes back decades; use the two-year transaction period and date filters to scope a cycle.

Do I need an API key? A built-in DEMO_KEY lets you try the scraper immediately, but it is rate limited to roughly 30 requests per hour. For any real volume, paste your own free key from api.data.gov/signup. It takes under a minute and raises the limit substantially.

How many records can I scrape in one run? You set the cap with Max Items. Contributions paginate through tens of millions of records using seek pagination, so you can pull anywhere from a handful to hundreds of thousands in a single run (a real API key is required for large runs).

Why are some fields empty on a record? The FEC only publishes what filers report. An individual donor record has an employer and occupation; an organization record may not. Candidate links and memo text appear only when present in the filing.

Is this affiliated with the FEC? No. This is an independent tool that reads only publicly available data from the FEC's open OpenFEC API. Federal campaign finance data is in the public domain.

Example use cases

Ready-to-run example tasks, each preconfigured for a common scenario. Open one and press run, or use it as a template:

• ActBlue Democratic Committee Finder on FEC: Look up ActBlue and related Democratic committees on the FEC with treasurer, filing contacts, committee IDs, type, and state. Export results to JSON, CSV, Excel
• Amazon Employee Political Donors 2022 FEC: Extract itemized 2022 FEC contributions from donors reporting Amazon as employer, with donor names, occupation, amount, date, and recipient. Export CSV, JSON, E
• Google Employee Political Donors 2024 FEC: Scrape itemized 2024 FEC contributions from donors who list Google as employer, with names, occupation, amount, date, and recipient committee. Export CSV or JSO
• Microsoft Employee Political Donors 2020 FEC: Pull itemized 2020 FEC contributions from donors listing Microsoft as employer, with names, occupation, amount, date, and recipient committee. Export CSV or JSO
• Super PAC Committees Directory on FEC: Build a directory of Super PAC committees registered with the FEC, including treasurer, filing contacts, committee IDs, and state. Export to JSON, CSV, or Excel
• Texas US Senate Candidates 2024 FEC: Get 2024 US Senate candidates in Texas from the FEC with party, total receipts, disbursements, and committee links. Export candidate data to JSON, CSV, or Excel
• WinRed Republican Committee Finder on FEC: Find WinRed and affiliated Republican committees on the FEC with treasurer names, filing contacts, committee IDs, type, and location. Export to JSON, CSV, Excel
• FEC 2024 Corporate Donors: FEC 2024 Corporate Donors
• FEC 2024 Presidential Candidates: FEC 2024 Presidential Candidates
• FEC California Political Donors: FEC California Political Donors

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This actor is an independent tool and has no affiliation with the Federal Election Commission or the US government. It only accesses data that is publicly available through the FEC's OpenFEC API. Federal campaign finance data is published in the public domain.