About the FEC Form 5 Report

Applies To: Federal Election Commission

The Form 5 is only filed by Non-Committee filers. For Political Committee filers, use the Form 24-IE or the Form 48-IE.

The FEC Form 5 Report is for reporting independent expenditures made and contributions received to be used by persons other than political committees. Independent expenditures aggregating in excess of $250 in a calendar year must report on this report. In order for these reports to work, both Expenses and Estimated Expenses need Support/Oppose Memos with either IE to Support or IE to Oppose.

Note that if a transaction has been reported on a Form 3/3x that has been marked as filed, that transaction will not pull to a Form 5.

Version Differences

24-Hour Report: Persons who make independent expenditures aggregating $1,000 or more towards a given election after the 20th day but more than 24 hours before the day of the election must file this version.
48-Hour Report: Persons who make independent expenditures aggregating $10,000 or more towards a given after-election outside of the 20 days before an election must be reported on this report.
Quarterly: Persons making independent expenditures over $250 in aggregation will need to report that on this report.

Static Aggregation

There are two different aggregation methods:

Running: aggregate amount is calculated as of the date of the transaction. Only transactions that meet or exceed the threshold amount will itemize.
Static: aggregate amount is calculated as of the end of the reporting period. If the threshold amount is met at that point, all transactions for the entity in the period will itemize.

For the FEC Form 5, the versions above use the Running Method. If you wish to use the Static Method, please check the box that says “Use Static Aggregate”.