FEC Votes 6-0 to Dismiss Complaint Over DCCC Recount-Account Payments to Elias Law Group

At an executive session on August 13, 2024 (vote date), the Federal Election Commission decided by a vote of 6-0 to dismiss MUR 8125, a complaint about DCCC payments to Elias Law Group from the party’s recounts-and-legal-proceedings account.

The complaint. Filed by the Committee to Defeat the President and Ted Harvey, it contended that “no general election recounts were pending” when the payments labeled “RECOUNT LEGAL SVCS” were made.

The record. The FEC general counsel’s report counted 126 such disbursements from October 19, 2021 to July 15, 2022, totaling $5,542,969.36, of which $5,177,460.62 went to Elias Law Group. The DCCC answered that FEC guidance has it label every payment from that account as a recount payment “whether the expense is for a recount or for an election contest” or another legal proceeding. The Commission dismissed the allegations against the DCCC and the firm.

How to read party filings after this. Contributions to this account run to 300% of the national-party limit, and its payments are reported as other disbursements on Line 29, outside the FEC’s bulk operating-expenditure file. The word recount on a national party’s legal payment identifies the paying account; it is not evidence that a recount took place.