Three super PACs aligned with top Republican and Democratic leaders in Congress routed roughly $44 million in the first quarter through affiliated nonprofits that shield donor identities before the money reached their midterm war chests, according to a Sludge review of recent FEC filings.
The practice has become increasingly common in super PAC fundraising in recent years: wealthy political donors choose to conceal their identities by first giving to sibling 501c(4) social welfare nonprofits that share the same leadership, staff, and organizational infrastructure. These nonprofits do not disclose their donors, but later transfer money into the super PACs, which do file donor disclosures with the Federal Election Commission. Those disclosures list only the nonprofit group as the contributor, without identifying the original sources of the funds, creating a disclosure gap in which the money becomes publicly visible only after its origin has been obscured.
The system is often called “gray money,” a reference to direct “dark money” political spending by nonprofits and shell LLCs, but with a disclosure layer at the super PAC level that creates the appearance of transparency but still leaves the original donor hidden.
While donors to both parties make use of this system, Democrats have disproportionately relied on it recently. In the first quarter of the year, the Chuck Schumer-affiliated Senate Majority PAC (SMP) received $25 million through its nonprofit, accounting for 44% of its total haul. The group’s Republican counterpart, the Senate Leadership Fund (SLF), routed about 16% of its contributions through its nonprofit. In the House, the Speaker Mike Johnson-backed Congressional Leadership Fund got $7.5 million in Q1 from its nonprofit partner the American Action Network, making up nearly 20% of its total contributions received.
