1 

FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION

1050 FIRST STREET, N.E.

WASHINGTON, D.C. 20463

BEFORE THE FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION

In the Matter of ) 

 ) MURs 7585/7588

Lori Trahan, et al. ) 

) 

STATEMENT OF REASONS OF CHAIR DARA LINDENBAUM, VICE CHAIRMAN SEAN J.

COOKSEY, AND COMMISSIONERS ALLEN DICKERSON AND JAMES E. “TREY”

TRAINOR, III

In these Matters, the Commission was asked to determine whether there was 

reason to believe (“RTB”) that Representative Lori Trahan of Massachusetts, her 

husband, and her campaign committee violated the Federal Election Campaign Act 

of 1971 (“FECA” or “Act”), as amended, by making and receiving excessive 

contributions and committing a series of reporting violations during the 2018 election 

cycle.1 Although our Office of General Counsel (“OGC”) recommended that the 

Commission find reason to believe that Respondents violated the Act and Commission 

regulations, after reviewing the record before us, and the allegations in the 

Complaint, the Commission instead found that there was no reason to believe that 

most of the allegations had resulted in violations of the law, and we invoked our 

prosecutorial discretion as to the remainder.2 We provide this Statement of Reasons 

to explain our basis for rejecting OGC’s recommendations.3 

1 52 U.S.C. §§ 30102(h); 30104(b); 30104(b)(3)(E); 30116(a)(1)(A). 

2 Certification (“Cert.”) at 3-4; Heckler v. Chaney, 470 U.S. 821, 835 (1985).

3 Dem. Cong. Campaign Comm. v. Fed. Election Comm’n, 831 F.2d 1131, 1135 (D.C. Cir. 1987) 

(establishing requirement that “[t]he Commission or the individual Commissioners” must provide a 

statement of reasons why the agency “rejected or failed to follow the General Counsel’s 

recommendation”). 

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I. Factual Background

These Matters came to the Commission’s attention pursuant to two complaints 

filed in March 2019, which were subsequently supplemented by both complainants.4

OGC reviewed these complaints, as well as responses from the Trahans and Rep. 

Trahan’s campaign committee.5 During the pendency of OGC’s review, which was 

interrupted by a lack of a quorum on the Commission, the House Committee on Ethics

(“Ethics Committee”) reviewed a referral related to the same conduct and issued a 

report regarding those allegations.6 OGC believed that the Ethics Committee’s report 

established the factual record in these Matters, and we agree.7

Lori Trahan successfully ran for Congress in 2018 and now represents 

Massachusetts’s Third Congressional District.8 She has been married to her husband, 

David Trahan, for over fifteen years.9 The Trahans signed legal documents “prior to 

marriage to define their rights and obligations during their marriage” confirming that 

the Trahans’ combined “‘wages, salary, and income’” is marital property which 

“‘[e]ach party shall have equal rights in regard to the management of and disposition 

of,’” and that “any real property purchased in joint title by the Trahans reflects the 

intent of the parties of have a joint interest in that property.”10

The generally private financial aspects of Rep. Trahan’s marriage became an 

issue of federal concern because “[d]uring her candidacy, Representative Trahan 

loaned funds to [her] [c]ampaign.”11 Specifically, Rep. Trahan lent her campaign 

4 First Gen’l Counsel’s Report (“FGCR”) at 1, MURs 7585/7585 (Trahan), Nov. 17, 2022 (noting 

identification of complainants and subsequent filings).

5 FGCR at 2-3 (summarizing complaints and responses).

6 Report of the Comm. on Ethics, In the Matter of Allegations Relating to Representative Lori Trahan 

(“Trahan Report”), U.S. House of Representatives Comm. on Ethics, July 16, 2020. 

7 FGCR at 5 (“[A]n investigation has already been conducted by [the Office of Congressional Ethics 

(“OCE”)] ...providing information, including financial records substantiating the violations”); id. at 34 

(“Because an investigation has already been conducted by OCE and we are in possession of copies of 

the financial records from that investigation, the record is sufficient at this juncture to proceed directly 

to conciliation on the violations that are reasonably established”). 

8 Trahan Report at 4-5. 

9 Id. at 5 (“Representative Trahan has been married to David Trahan since November 17, 2007”).

10 Id. (quoting from Trahan Report Ex. 1, the Trahans’ prenuptial agreement). 

11 Id. at 6.

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$371,000 in four tranches: three from her personal funds, and a final $71,000 from a 

home equity loan initially obtained in 201012 based on value of the Trahans’ shared 

domicile.13 Having obtained access to detailed accounting of the Trahans’ personal 

finances, OGC reviewed the circumstances around these loans. It noted that Mr. 

Trahan made deposits to the joint account during the time that Rep. Trahan used 

that account to lend funds to her campaign committee, and that Mr. Trahan also 

made a payment on the home equity line of credit after Rep. Trahan drew on that line 

for her campaign.14

OGC’s conclusion from this review was that money to which both husband and 

wife were equally entitled, was, in fact, the property of the husband.15 Therefore, 

prenuptial-agreement and marital-property rules aside, the money lent to the 

campaign was Mr. Trahan’s, not Rep. Trahan’s.16 Having thus legally separated Mr. 

Trahan from Rep. Trahan, at least financially, OGC concluded that the entire 

$371,000 lent to the Trahan campaign committee was an illegal contribution from a 

husband to his wife.17

12 FGCR at 9.

13 Id. at 6 (chart breaking out loans). The home equity loan was originally reported as coming from the 

candidate’s personal funds, rather than on the appropriate Schedule C-1 (Loans and Lines of Credit 

from Lending Institutions). Id. at 6-7. While this initial misreporting was a FECA violation, because 

it was corrected, and because we did not consider the underlying transaction itself to be illegal (as 

OGC did), id. at 24-26, we dismissed this reporting violation pursuant to our prosecutorial discretion. 

Cert. at 4, ¶ 4(d). 

14 FGCR at 7-9, 13-26 (describing and analyzing the loans and concomitant transactions).

15 FGCR at 3 (“Mr. Trahan’s income was the true source of the funds”). 

16 Id. at 20 (“Under Massachusetts law, the Trahans’ prenuptial agreement appears to give broad 

property rights to Rep. Trahan over marital property, including Mr. Trahan’s income earned during 

the marriage,” but because “Rep. Trahan does not appear to have had access to or control over either 

Mr. Trahan’s future income or even the underlying entities that paid the income — which were titled 

in his name (and presumably those of his partners) but not hers — when Rep. Trahan became a 

candidate” Massachusetts law was ousted); id. at 24-25 (conceding Rep. Trahan’s personal control over 

funds derived from the home line of credit, but arguing that because Mr. Trahan made a payment back 

to the line of credit, “the actual circumstances” were “that Mr. Trahan became the creditor who 

provided a loan and thus made the contribution”).

17 Id. at 24, 26. The constitutional purpose behind contribution limits is to avoid quid pro quo

corruption. Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1, 28 (1976) (per curiam); McCutcheon v. Fed. Election Comm’n, 

572 U.S. 185, 192 (2014) (“Campaign finance restrictions that pursue other objectives, we have 

explained, impermissibly inject the Government ‘into the debate over who should govern’) (quoting 

Ariz. Free Enter. Club’s Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett, 564 U.S. 721, 750 (2011)). That interest is 

somewhat attenuated where, as here, the financial transfers occur between spouses, and especially 

spouses who broadly share a joint right to each other’s funds. Even if there were a generalizable 

corruption interest at issue, it is not obvious that highly-invasive investigations into the intimate 

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II. Legal Analysis

a. Representative Trahan, not Mr. Trahan, was responsible for the $371,000 in 

loans, and there was no reason to believe otherwise.

Personal funds are not subject to the candidate contribution limits.18 The 

Commission has explained what may be considered a candidate’s personal funds, as 

well as the circumstances where a candidate’s home equity line of credit may be used

for her campaign. 

Specifically, the FEC defines the “[p]ersonal funds of a candidate” as, inter alia, 

assets jointly owned with a spouse as well as any assets “the candidate ha[s] legal 

right of access to or control over.”19 Additionally, candidates may legally access a 

home equity line of credit, so long as “[s]uch loan is made in accordance with 

applicable law and under commercially reasonable terms” and the credit was offered

“in the normal course of the [lender]’s business.”20

The Ethics Committee’s exhaustive investigation explained how the Trahans 

pooled and accessed funds in the joint checking account Representative Trahan used 

to make $300,000 of loans to her campaign.21 Under the most natural reading of our 

regulations, funds placed in a joint checking account shared by husband and wife are

unquestionably funds which the wife “ha[s] legal right of access to or control over.”22

financial arrangements of married couples is at all proportional to the government’s interest. M.L.B. 

v. S.L.J., 519 U.S. 102, 117 (1996) (“Choices about marriage [and] family life” are “among [those] 

associational rights this Court has ranked as ‘of basic importance in our society’” “sheltered by the 

[Constitution] against the State’s unwarranted usurpation, disregard, or disrespect”) (quoting Boddie 

v. Conn., 401 U.S. 371, 376 (1971)). 

18 Buckley, 424 U.S. at 53.

19 11 C.F.R. § 100.33.

20 11 C.F.R. § 100.83(a)(1-2).

21 Trahan Report at 12-15 (describing in detail the setting up of the joint checking account and the 

discrete transactions surrounding the loans and concluding “[i]t appears that, in accordance with the 

agreement, the Trahans’ incomes that were marital property were held in their personal and joint 

checking accounts, which were used interchangeably by the couple. The prenuptial agreement allows 

Representative Trahan to manage and dispose of all marital property, regardless of the bank account 

it was held in”). 

22 11 C.F.R. § 100.33.

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Thus, we concluded that those three loans were, in fact, made from Congresswoman 

Trahan’s personal funds, and were not illegal contributions made by her husband.23

The Ethics Committee’s investigation also found that the home equity line of 

credit used for the final $71,000 loan “was obtained in accordance with all laws and 

under commercially reasonable terms.”24 Even OGC conceded that the $71,000 lent 

to the campaign “us[ed] funds obtained through [the Trahans’] home equity line of 

credit,” was “far below her share of the jointly-owned asset,” and therefore would 

normally count as coming from the Congresswoman’s personal funds.25 We reject the 

suggestion that a later payment on that line of credit by Mr. Trahan—a co-signer on 

the loan (and, again, the husband of the co-signing wife)—transformed Mr. Trahan 

into a creditor to Rep. Trahan.26 Rep. Trahan was an equal party to a commercially 

reasonable line of credit, and the loan made to her campaign was below her share of 

that joint asset. That is all our regulations require.27

23 The terms of the Trahans’ prenuptial agreement strengthen this conclusion. Indeed, while joint 

accounts should generally be treated as personal property of both account holders under our 

regulations, to have determined otherwise here would not only have misread the law but also deprived 

the Trahans’ prenuptial agreement of legal effect, at least for purposes of the federal campaign finance 

laws. We do not believe that result is required by our regulations. But we also emphasize that invasive 

investigations of a married couple’s finances are inappropriate where the lawfulness of a contribution, 

such as the loan at issue here, is clear. 

24 Trahan Report at 15, n.147.

25 FGCR at 24.

26 Id. at 25.

27 11 C.F.R. § 100.83.

MUR758500205
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In sum, Mrs. Trahan made loans to her campaign from her personal funds.28

There is nothing illegal about that and we voted accordingly.29 

b. The remaining recordkeeping and reporting violations were not worth the 

time and resources of the federal government. 

In the course of its review, OGC found that the Trahan committee failed to 

timely deposit the Congresswoman’s check for the fourth loan within the appropriate 

ten-day period.30 This is true, but the check was ultimately deposited. 31 This 

allegation, like the admitted reporting error which the Trahan committee has already 

corrected,32 is simply not worth the expenditure of additional federal resources.33

28 In coming to this conclusion, we agree with the Ethics Committee, which also concluded that these 

four loans did not violate FECA. Trahan Report at 15 (“Because Massachusetts law allows for 

prenuptial agreements like the Trahans’, and the prenuptial agreement provided Representative 

Trahan, long before she was a candidate, equal rights to manage and dispose of Mr. Trahan’s salary 

and income, the Committee found Mr. Trahan’s salary and income satisfied the definition of a 

candidate’s personal funds under FECA”); id. at 16 (“[T]he Committee found the $71,000 loan did not 

result in an excessive contribution from Mr. Trahan to the Campaign”).

This agreement comes from an independent analysis of the same facts and the same law, and it should 

be unsurprising that we agree with the Ethics Committee. But it is noteworthy that OGC looked at 

the same evidence and came to the opposite conclusion. This is doubtless a cautionary tale about the 

overly complicated nature of our campaign finance rules, where even experts cannot seem to 

consistently agree even when apprised of all the facts.

29 OGC also alleged that the Trahan committee did not merely misreport the source of the loans (i.e. 

attributing them to Representative Trahan’s personal funds rather than her husband), because the 

loans were reported as being received on the day they were written rather than the day they were 

cashed. FGCR at 29. We concluded that this was not a FECA violation. As even OGC conceded, it is 

our ordinary policy to “mak[e] the date of conveyance” of a check “the date of receipt.” Id. We declined 

to create a different rule solely for the circumstances of the Trahan committee.

30 See 52 U.S.C. § 30102(h).

31 On September 2, 2018—over four years ago.

32 Supra at n.13. 

33 Heckler, 470 U.S. at 831 (“[T]he agency must not only assess whether a violation has occurred, but 

whether agency resources are best spent on this violation or another...An agency generally cannot act 

against each technical violation of the statute it is charged with enforcing”). 

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CONCLUSION

The federal government should pause before scrutinizing the minute financial 

arrangements of married couples. This is so even where one of the spouses has been 

elected to federal office. And in the rare circumstances where such an investigation

is justified, the government should take care not to assume that assets jointly owned 

or controlled by a husband and wife are solely the property of one spouse.34 Moreover, 

both prudence and humility suggest that where an expert body, with full knowledge 

of the facts, has found that no wrongdoing occurred, we should be hesitant to 

countermand that finding. Our Office of General Counsel was doubtless sincere in 

recommending enforcement in the face of a contrary judgment by the Ethics 

Committee, but we believe the Committee was correct, and are glad that a conflict 

that would have further muddied federal campaign finance law has been avoided.

For those reasons, and those given above, we rejected the recommendations of 

our General Counsel, found no reason to believe that the most serious allegations 

were true, and dismissed the remaining technical violations in the exercise of our 

prosecutorial discretion. 

34 Cf. Statement of Chairman Dickerson and Comm’r Broussard Regarding Advisory Opinion 2022-07 

(Swalwell) (“The question of whether a candidate’s spouse is technically available to provide childcare 

is an inherently subjective inquiry and...well outside the Commission’s purview.”).

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_________________________________ _________________________

Dara Lindenbaum Date

Chair

_________________________________ _________________________

Sean J. Cooksey Date

Vice Chairman

_________________________________ _________________________

Allen Dickerson Date

Commissioner

_________________________________ _________________________

James E. “Trey” Trainor, III Date

Commissioner

February 22, 2023

February 22, 2023

February 22, 2023

February 22, 2023

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