Secretive super PAC funding is skyrocketing in primaries

A record number of groups are exploiting a gap in campaign finance law to flood this year's primary elections with money — without disclosing their donors until long after the race is over. More than $48 million has already been spent on House and Senate primaries this year by super PACs that did not have to reveal their donors before elections took place, according to a POLITICO analysis of data from the Federal Election Commission. That is more than double the total at this time in the 2024 cycle, and 10 times higher than in 2018. The groups are taking advantage of the campaign finance calendar. A super PAC formed after the last pre-election FEC deadline can raise and spend unlimited amounts of money in the crucial final days of an election without disclosing its donors until afterward. The practice has been used for years, but never to the degree of this year’s midterms.Roughly 1 in 10 dollars in outside spending that has flowed into primaries so far this year has been through these secretive groups. In some cases, the pop-up super PAC spending has the characteristics of one political party meddling in another’s primary to help boost a candidate seen as more beatable in November, which is what happened in competitive races in Texas’ 35th District, Maine’s 2nd District and most recently New York’s 17th District. In other cases, groups sought to hide their connection to controversial sources, like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. “It's certainly a very strategic effort to avoid providing transparency for voters,” said Saurav Ghosh, director of federal campaign finance reform at the nonprofit Campaign Legal Center. “So even if they're acting within the letter of the law, they are ultimately undermining in spirit. Because disclosure requirements exist so that voters — when they're deciding who to cast their ballot for — have the information about who has spent money backing these candidates.” The path for secretive spending on primaries is relatively str