In the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, a political party committee is an organization, officially affiliated with a

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific political ideology ...

and registered with the

Federal Elections Commission The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is an independent regulatory agency of the United States whose purpose is to enforce campaign finance law in United States federal elections. Created in 1974 through amendments to the Federal Election Camp ...

(FEC), which raises and spends money for

political campaign A political campaign is an organized effort which seeks to influence the decision making progress within a specific group. In democracies, political campaigns often refer to electoral campaigns, by which representatives are chosen or referend ...

ing. Political party committees are distinct from political action committees, which are formally independent of political parties and subject to different rules. Though their own internal rules differ, the two major political parties ( Democrats and Republicans) have essentially parallel sets of committees. (Third parties have varied organizational structures, although several do have national committees officially recognized by the FEC.)

National committees

The

Democratic National Committee The Democratic National Committee (DNC) is the governing body of the United States Democratic Party. The committee coordinates strategy to support Democratic Party candidates throughout the country for local, state, and national office, as well a ...

, Reform Party National Committee,

Green National Committee The Green National Committee (GNC) is the central governing body of the Green Party of the United States. The committee is composed of over 150 delegates from every affiliated state party and recognized caucus. The GNC oversees all national part ...

Libertarian National Committee The Libertarian National Committee (LNC) controls and manages the affairs, properties, and funds of the United States Libertarian Party. It is composed of the party officers, five at-large representatives elected every two years at the national c ...

, and

Republican National Committee The Republican National Committee (RNC) is a U.S. political committee that assists the Republican Party of the United States. It is responsible for developing and promoting the Republican brand and political platform, as well as assisting in fu ...

are the official central organizations for their respective parties. They have the greatest role in

presidential election A presidential election is the election of any head of state whose official title is President. Elections by country Albania The president of Albania is elected by the Assembly of Albania who are elected by the Albanian public. Chile The pre ...

years when they are responsible for planning the nominating convention and also spend heavily in support of their party's nominee (some of this spending is directly coordinated with the nominee's campaign; the rest is in

independent expenditure An independent expenditure, in elections in the United States, is a political campaign communication that Issue advocacy ads, expressly advocates for the election or defeat of a clearly identified candidate that is not made in cooperation, consulta ...

s). The two major parties also have two national

Hill committee The Hill committees are the common name for the political party committees that work to elect members of their own party to United States Congress ("Hill" refers to Capitol Hill, where the seat of Congress, the Capitol, is located). The four major ...

s, controlled by their caucus leadership in each house of Congress, which work specifically to elect members of their own party to Congress. The individual contribution limit to a single national party committee is currently $32,400 per calendar year, but is indexed to inflation.

State and local committees

State party organizations typically have both federal and non-federal accounts, and money can be transferred between the two under certain circumstances. (A third and more complicated category of money,

Levin funds Levin may refer to: * Levin (given name) * Levin (surname) * Levin, New Zealand, a town in southern North Island * Toyota Corolla Levin, an automobile * Levin (guitar company), Sweden * Konstantin Dmitrievitch Levin, a character in Tolstoy's Anna ...

, has been created by the

Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (, ), commonly known as the McCain–Feingold Act or BCRA (pronounced "bik-ruh"), is a United States federal law that amended the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, which regulates the financing of ...

.) The federal limit for individual contributions to state and local party committees is a combined total of $10,000 per year. In most states, legislative campaign committees or assembly campaign committees are operated by political parties in order to raise funds and campaign for the election of party members to the state legislatures. These are federated under such national organizations as the

Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee The Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee (DLCC) is the Democratic Party (United States), U.S. Democratic Party organization that works to elect Democrats to State legislature (United States), state legislatures. The committee was formed after ...

(formed in 1994) and

Republican Legislative Campaign Committee Republican can refer to: Political ideology * An advocate of a republic, a type of government that is not a monarchy or dictatorship, and is usually associated with the rule of law. ** Republicanism, the ideology in support of republics or agains ...

(formed in 2002).

National committees

State and local committees

See also