FEC’s Three-Part Test for Coordinated Communications

The Federal Election Commission’s three-part test for coordinated communications asks three questions about a political ad: Did someone other than the candidate pay for it? Does its content fall into one of five election-related categories? And did the candidate or campaign have a qualifying interaction with the outside spender? If the answer to all three is yes, the full cost of the ad is treated as an in-kind contribution to the candidate, subject to federal contribution limits and source prohibitions. The test lives in 11 CFR 109.21 and reaches everything from broadcast spots to mailers to paid digital ads.¹

Prong One: Who Paid

The payment prong asks whether someone other than the candidate, the candidate’s authorized committee, or a political party committee paid for the communication. The outside payer can be a PAC, a corporation, a labor organization, or an individual. Covering even a portion of production or distribution costs is enough to satisfy this element.¹

If the candidate’s own committee or a party committee pays for everything, the analysis stops here. The FEC also looks past third-party vendors and consultants to identify where the money actually originates, not just whose name is on the invoice.

Prong Two: What the Ad Says and When It Runs

The content prong is met if the communication falls into any one of five categories.

Electioneering Communications

A broadcast, cable, or satellite ad that names or identifies a federal candidate and airs within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election. For House and Senate races, the ad also has to reach the candidate’s electorate. This category is limited to broadcast media and does not cover print, billboards, or internet ads.²

Express Advocacy

A communication that explicitly urges viewers to elect or defeat a candidate, using words like “vote for,” “elect,” “defeat,” or “reject.” The FEC also applies a broader test that captures messages a reasonable person could only interpret as advocating for or against a specific candidate, even without those exact words. Timing does not matter for this category.³

Republished Campaign Materials

Any public communication that reproduces, distributes, or republishes materials originally prepared by a candidate or the candidate’s campaign. Reusing campaign videos, photographs, graphics, or written content in an outside ad triggers this standard.¹

Timing-Based Standards for Public Communications

Two additional standards catch public communications that name a candidate near an election without using express advocacy language. For ads mentioning a House or Senate candidate, the window is 90 days before the candidate’s primary, general, special, or runoff election, and the ad must be distributed within the candidate’s jurisdiction. For ads mentioning a presidential or vice-presidential candidate, the window starts 120 days before a primary or caucus in a given jurisdiction and runs through the general election.¹

p>”Public communication” is a defined term. It covers broadcast, cable, and satellite ads, newspaper and magazine ads, billboards and other outdoor advertising, mass mailings, telephone banks, and paid online ads placed for a fee on someone else’s website or platform. Organic social media posts and unpaid internet content are excluded.⁴

Prong Three: Conduct Between the Spender and the Campaign

The conduct prong is where coordination cases are actually won or lost. Payment and content are usually easy to establish. Conduct requires proof of a qualifying interaction, and the regulation lists five types. Any one is enough. No formal agreement is required; a mutual understanding about any material aspect of the communication is sufficient.¹

Request or Suggestion

The candidate or campaign asks someone to create, produce, or distribute the communication. It also works in reverse: if the outside spender suggests the ad and the candidate or campaign agrees, that assent is enough.

Material Involvement

A candidate or campaign helps make decisions about the ad’s content, intended audience, media outlet, timing, frequency, or size and duration. The campaign does not have to write the script. Weighing in on which stations to buy or when the ad should start running qualifies.

Substantial Discussion

Conversations between the outside spender and the candidate or campaign about the campaign’s plans, strategy, or needs meet this standard if the discussions are material to how the ad gets created or distributed. No formal agreement has to come out of the discussions.

Common Vendor

Political consultants, media buyers, and ad producers often work for several clients in the same cycle. When the same vendor serves both a candidate and the outside group paying for an ad, the conduct standard is met if three conditions all hold: the outside spender hired the vendor, the vendor provided strategic services to the candidate within the previous 120 days (such as media strategy, polling, fundraising, audience targeting, or content development), and the vendor used or shared information about the candidate’s campaign plans that was material to the outside ad.¹

Former Employees and Contractors

If the person paying for a communication employs someone who worked for the referenced candidate’s campaign within the previous 120 days, and that person uses or shares non-public campaign information material to the ad, the conduct prong is satisfied.

Safe Harbors

The rules include protections that prevent innocent overlap from being treated as illegal coordination. These matter because the political consulting world is small and information moves easily between campaigns and outside groups.

Firewall Policies

A written firewall policy can shield organizations that employ people working on both sides of the line. The policy must be designed to block the flow of information between employees or consultants working for the outside spender and those providing services to the candidate. It must be written down and distributed to every affected employee, consultant, and client. When a firewall is properly implemented, the common vendor and former employee standards are not met. The protection disappears if evidence shows non-public campaign information actually crossed the wall.¹

Publicly Available Information

The material involvement, substantial discussion, common vendor, and former employee standards are all subject to the same exception: they are not satisfied if the information used to create or distribute the ad came from a publicly available source. This includes newspaper and magazine articles, candidate speeches, press releases, interview transcripts, the candidate’s own website, and any other publicly accessible material.⁵

Press Exemption

Legitimate news stories, commentaries, and editorials distributed through a broadcasting station, newspaper, magazine, or other periodical are exempt from the definitions of “contribution” and “expenditure” entirely, so they cannot be coordinated communications. The exemption does not apply to content distributed through facilities owned or controlled by a candidate, political committee, or political party.⁶

What Happens When All Three Prongs Are Met

When all three prongs are satisfied, the entire cost of the communication becomes an in-kind contribution to the candidate or party committee with which it was coordinated. The spending is no longer treated as an independent expenditure, which would be constitutionally unlimited. It counts against federal contribution limits instead.¹

For the 2025–2026 election cycle, an individual can contribute no more than $3,500 per election to a federal candidate. A coordinated ad costing $50,000 to produce and air blows past that cap by a factor of fourteen.⁷

The consequences are harsher for corporations and labor unions. Federal law flatly prohibits these entities from contributing to federal candidates. A coordinated communication paid for by a corporation or union is not just an excessive contribution but a prohibited one.⁸

Party committees operate under a separate framework. Coordinated expenditures by national and state party committees are permitted but capped at amounts that vary by office and are indexed for inflation. Those limits are separate from and in addition to direct contributions the party makes to a candidate.⁹

Reporting and Disclaimers

Once a communication is classified as coordinated, both sides have reporting duties. The outside spender must report the cost as an in-kind contribution to the candidate, itemizing the vendor, date, amount, purpose, and the candidate’s name, office sought, and election.¹⁰ The candidate’s committee reports the in-kind contribution as both a receipt and an expenditure, because the campaign received something of value and “spent” the equivalent amount on the ad.

Disclaimers are also required. If the candidate authorized the ad, the disclaimer must identify the outside payer and state that the candidate approved the message. If the ad was not authorized, the disclaimer must identify the payer, state that no candidate authorized the communication, and include the payer’s street address, phone number, or website. Television ads carry additional requirements, including a candidate voiceover or full-screen image for authorized ads.¹¹

Penalties

The FEC enforces coordination violations through a complaint-driven process. If the Commission finds reason to believe a violation occurred, it tries to resolve the matter through a conciliation agreement. For a standard violation, the civil penalty in conciliation cannot exceed the greater of $10,000 or the amount of the contribution or expenditure involved. For a knowing and willful violation, the ceiling rises to the greater of $10,000 or 200 percent of the amount involved.¹²

Criminal prosecution is reserved for the most serious cases. If four Commissioners vote to find probable cause of a knowing and willful violation, the FEC may refer the matter to the Department of Justice.¹³ A knowing and willful violation involving $25,000 or more in a calendar year can result in up to five years in prison. Violations between $2,000 and $25,000 carry up to one year.¹²

The FEC also runs a separate administrative fine program for reporting failures. If a committee fails to timely disclose a coordinated in-kind contribution, the fine reflects the election sensitivity of the report, the level of financial activity, whether the report was late or never filed, and the committee’s history of prior violations.¹⁴

1
eCFR. 11 CFR 109.21 – What is a “Coordinated Communication”?
2
eCFR. 11 CFR 100.29 – Electioneering Communication
3
eCFR. 11 CFR 100.22 – Expressly Advocating
4
eCFR. 11 CFR 100.26 – Public Communication
5
Federal Election Commission. Coordinated Communications
6
Federal Election Commission. AO 2005-07 – Certain Commentaries and Editorials Are Prohibited Corporate Contributions if Coordinated
7
Federal Election Commission. Contribution Limits for 2025-2026
8
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 52 USC 30118 – Contributions or Expenditures by National Banks, Corporations, or Labor Organizations
9
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 52 USC 30116 – Limitations on Contributions and Expenditures
10
Federal Election Commission. In-Kind Contributions to Candidates
11
Federal Election Commission. Advertising and Disclaimers
12
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 52 USC 30109 – Enforcement
13
Federal Register. Memorandum of Understanding Regarding the Enforcement of Federal Campaign Finance Laws
14
Federal Election Commission. Calculating Administrative Fines