CLC Petitions FEC to Explicitly Include Streaming Media Services in Political Ad Rules

On December 1, 2025, Campaign Legal Center (CLC) petitioned the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to open a rulemaking to explicitly incorporate streaming media services in its regulations. CLC’s petition points out that the FEC has failed to make clear that federal campaign finance laws regulating “television,” “radio,” and “broadcast, cable, or satellite” communications also encompass streaming political ads — which are effectively the same as political ads on traditional media platforms and should therefore be subject to the same legal requirements. This failure creates significant ambiguity and confusion for political groups, which are spending billions of dollars on streaming political ads each election cycle, and ultimately threatens to undermine the legal guardrails intended to curtail corruption and ensure transparency for voters.