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The DNC Fight to Ban Dark Money in Presidential Primaries

Dark money has been flooding into Democratic primaries, from the pop-up super PACs swamping Illinois House races this spring to outside spending groups funneling tens of millions into Michigan’s Senate primary.

Now Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin says the DNC is on the verge of adopting a plan to eliminate anonymous spending and unlimited corporate money in a high-profile contest it controls: the 2028 presidential primary.

Martin, who was elected as chair with a groundswell of support from state parties, moved forward last year with a process to craft new rules for the party’s White House hopefuls. But the plan—which Martin did not present to DNC members this summer, as originally scheduled—is still being debated behind closed doors inside the national party, even as 2028 White House hopefuls get ready to announce.

In August 2025, in a breakthrough step, Martin proposed a resolution to DNC members that the party was “committed to eliminating unlimited corporate and dark money in our presidential nominating process beginning in the current 2028 cycle.” It directed the party to develop “real, enforceable steps the DNC can take” to curb super PAC influence and independent expenditures in the presidential primary. The resolution was passed unanimously by the DNC Resolutions Committee and by the full DNC of around 450 members.

For over a decade, progressives and Democratic reformers have advocated for rules changes that would aim to reorient primaries around voters and party-building, curbing deep-pocketed outside spending groups from unloading cash to back their favored candidates. The DNC’s plan would be limited to its presidential primary—it would not apply to candidates backed by independent expenditures in congressional races or general elections. Recognizing that the Supreme Court has defended unlimited outside spending in elections, the resolution called for broader campaign finance reforms to undo what it called the “disastrous” Citizens United decision.

The text of the Resolution on Integrity in the Financing of Our Presidential Primary Elections directed a new DNC reform body “to produce a report on this matter to the full DNC by its summer meeting in 2026.” The resulting DNC Task Force on Reforms debated and produced what it calls a set of recommendations that were delivered to Martin in late June, according to the panel’s co-chairs and several members involved who spoke with The Nation.

But the task force’s recommendations were not presented at the DNC’s August 13–15 summer meeting in Austin—because, a DNC official said, other panels inside the national party were still weighing in on the proposal. The official told The Nation that despite the 2025 resolution’s instruction for a report to be adopted at the summer meeting, that timeline was just aspirational, and that the task force’s recommendations were not binding. They referred to its assignment as “brainstorming” rather than drafting a formal resolution for the full DNC membership to approve.

“I have made my position on this clear from day one as chair: We must end the influence of dark money in our politics and restore power back to the people,” Martin said in a statement to The Nation. “The Democratic Party has fought and will keep fighting to get dark money out of politics through Congress and in court, but the DNC isn’t standing idly by in the meantime. That’s why I introduced a resolution in 2025 instructing the DNC to explore other options to rein in corporate and dark money in Democratic presidential primaries. That important work is ongoing, but will be completed in the coming months.”

The DNC official........

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