Maine candidate fundraising — 2020 cycle

Why Maine and 2020 share one LobbyVault page

$114,195,051.43 is the overlap of two FEC dimensions: election cycle 2020, and candidate office state Maine (ME). 15 candidates survive both filters. The cycle side with the state filter removed is $7,976,535,091.66 from 2459 candidates nationwide. Maine therefore accounts for 1.4% of 2020 U.S. candidate receipts in these facts. The remaining $7,862,340,040.23 (98.6%) was reported by candidates whose office state is not ME.

This is not a restatement of Maine campaign finance. That hub mixes 2020 with every other even-year window filed under office state ME. It is also not a restatement of the 2020 election cycle hub, which mixes Maine with every other office state. 15 candidates and $114,195,051.43 exist only where both filters are true. Correlation is not causation: an office-state code plus a cycle year does not prove why money was raised, which office drove the total, or who the donors were.

FEC candidate files store office state as the state of the seat sought, not the donor's home address. Maine (ME) is the FEC office-state code. New Hampshire and Massachusetts office states are not recoded into ME. 2020 is a presidential FEC cycle: a two-year window that includes a presidential general election. That calendar tag dates the receipts. It does not explain $114.2 million. The 2020 cycle is a closed even-year window in this extract; $114,195,051.43 is the stored Maine office-state total for that window. Source: FEC.gov candidate receipts grouped by election cycle and office state.

The Maine (ME) side of the join

On the state side, Maine indexes $114,195,051.43 of candidate receipts in cycle 2020 from 15 candidates. That figure is the office-state total for this cycle, not an all-years Maine census and not a count of residents. It is already inside the national 2020 total of $7,976,535,091.66; adding $114,195,051.43 to $7,976,535,091.66 would double-count the Maine slice. Maine campaign-finance pages still mix 2020 with every other cycle.

Maine (ME) is the FEC office-state code. New Hampshire and Massachusetts office states are not recoded into ME. Office state ME stays on the citation so Maine is not merged with another state's candidates. A large state-cycle total does not mean donors lived in Maine. Recipient committees of those campaigns file as candidate committees; this join does not publish a donor-city cut. Use the Maine hub to see the state without a year filter, and use this tie page when the question is specifically Maine in 2020.

The 2020 cycle side next to Maine

Federal election cycles are two-year windows on FEC.gov. The 2020 cycle is the Commission's cycle tag on candidate receipts, not a single calendar year of January filings only. Inside that window, U.S. candidates reported $7,976,535,091.66 across 2459 candidates. Maine's slice of that window is $114,195,051.43 from 15 candidates. Dividing national dollars by national candidates gives a mean of about $3.24 million per U.S. candidate. That mean is an arithmetic average of candidates, not a typical campaign and not a median.

The national 2020 hub still includes every other office state. State pages for Maine still include every other cycle. Only this join isolates Maine × 2020. Independent expenditures are omitted from both $114,195,051.43 and $7,976,535,091.66 as they appear here. Adjacent pages for the 2020 election cycle, Maine campaign finance, all election cycles, and all FEC ties keep those broader cuts.

Maine's share of the 2020 national cycle

1.4% of $7,976,535,091.66 is a defined slice. Other office states hold $7,862,340,040.23. Put another way, about 1.4% of 2020 U.S. candidate receipts in this aggregate were tagged office state ME, and about 98.6% were not. Those percentages are $114,195,051.43 divided by $7,976,535,091.66 and $7,862,340,040.23 divided by $7,976,535,091.66. They are not shares of state population, eligible voters, or USAspending.

Dollar share (1.4%) and candidate volume (15 of 2459) are separate facts. This page does not publish a candidate-count percentage as a substitute for the dollar share. Do not treat 1.4% as Maine donors' share of national itemized giving. Donor tables are other joins.

Counts, dollars, and what they omit

15 candidates totaling $114,195,051.43 is the operational definition of the Maine side. The FEC file can list primary losers, general-election nominees, and other federal candidates under the same office-state code. Unique-person counts beyond that candidate total are not in the packet. Neither is a ranking of Maine versus other states: this join has one geography and one cycle.

Mean receipts of about $7.61 million use only $114,195,051.43 and 15. It is a trivial ratio, not a finding about wealth, turnout, or ideology. This cycle-state page does not break $114,195,051.43 out by occupation of donors, industry, or named committee. No donor names are supplied, and none are added.

Caveats on a cycle-state join

This page does not rank Maine against other states, does not call 2020 a wave, and does not treat candidate receipts as a proxy for public opinion in Maine. Two columns matched. The office state of the candidate is not the state of the donor. An ME office-state code does not mean the money supported only Maine residents. Amended reports can move either number. If the live Maine hub or the live 2020 cycle hub disagrees with this prose, the newer FEC extract controls.

Independent expenditures and non-candidate tables are omitted. See the 2020 election cycle, Maine campaign finance, all election cycles, and all FEC ties for the adjacent tables. Dollar figures are FEC candidate receipt aggregates. They are not federal spending awards and they do not fund USAspending totals. Source: FEC.gov.

Questions

What is the 2020 Maine candidate-receipt total?

$114.2 million ($114,195,051.43) from 15 candidates whose FEC office state is ME. Source: FEC.gov. That number is not the national 2020 total of $8.0 billion from 2459 candidates. Mixing the two columns is incorrect. Quote $114,195,051.43 only as Maine in 2020, and quote $7,976,535,091.66 only as the U.S. 2020 book.

What share of 2020 U.S. candidate receipts came from Maine office-state candidates?

1.4%. That is $114,195,051.43 divided by $7,976,535,091.66. The complement is 98.6%, or $7,862,340,040.23, from candidates whose office state is not ME. The share is not a share of donors, votes, or federal awards, and it is not a ranking of Maine against unnamed other states.

Are independent expenditures included in the Maine 2020 total?

No. The source note on this page is candidate receipts grouped by election cycle and office state, not independent expenditures. $114,195,051.43 should not be quoted as a complete picture of 2020 political spending in Maine. Super PAC and other independent-spend files are separate tables.

Do these FEC receipts fund federal spending in Maine?

No. FEC candidate receipts and USAspending obligations are different datasets. $114,195,051.43 is campaign money reported by Maine office-state candidates in 2020. It is not an award total and does not pay for federal contracts or grants. Do not add it to USAspending figures for Maine.