🗳️ 2026 Midterm Election Scams: The 4 the FBI Warned About

By Muhammad Imran · Reviewed for accuracy against FBI IC3 fraud guidance · Last updated November 4, 2026.

Update: November 4, 2026. The November 3 midterms have passed. The four schemes on this page are still running as post-election refund, donation and registration scams.

The midterms are over, and your phone knows it. Texts from campaigns, donation appeals, "matching funds end tonight". Most of them are real, which is exactly the cover scammers need. When a fake donation pitch or a fake registration alert lands in the middle of thirty real ones, it doesn't stand out.

The FBI's Internet Crime Complaint Center saw it coming and put out a public alert on October 15 naming the four plays it expected around this election. An update to a nearly identical warning it issued before the 2024 election. The plays come back every cycle, the FBI notes, because they keep working. These are election scams targeting seniors in particular: scammers know older Americans vote in high numbers, donate to causes they believe in, and handle more of their giving online than ever. This guide walks through each of the four schemes in plain English. How it reaches you, why it works on good people, and the exact check that defeats it.

Scheme 1: The "campaign investment pool"

How it plays. Someone. By text, email, social media, or a slick-looking website. Invites you to put money into a pool tied to a candidate. Win or lose at the ballot box, you're promised a guaranteed return: your contribution "invested," paying out after the candidate wins. To grow your share, you're encouraged to recruit friends and family into the pool. That recruiting step is the pyramid shape showing through.

Why it works. It dresses a donation in the clothes of an investment, and investments feel rational. The "guaranteed return" language borrows the trust people place in savings and retirement accounts. And the recruiting turns victims into marketers. A recommendation from a friend carries more weight than any ad.

The tell. A real campaign donation never pays you back. Ever. The FBI's sentence is the whole test: if there's a promised return, it's a scam, no matter how official the website looks, how patriotic the language is, or who "guarantees" it. It's the same guaranteed-return script as classic investment fraud. Just wearing a campaign badge this season.

Scheme 2: The ScamPAC

How it plays. You get an urgent appeal. A text or email warning that "our side" is falling behind, with a link to donate to a political action committee. The name sounds familiar. The logo looks right. The money goes to scammers who have no connection to any real PAC, and not a cent reaches a campaign.

Why it works. PAC names are easy to imitate, and in the final weeks before an election the appeals come fast and emotional. Nobody pauses to audit a committee when the message says the other side just outraised us three-to-one.

The tell. Look it up yourself at fec.gov, the Federal Election Commission's website, where real PACs file registrations and financial reports. But read the fine print: the FBI specifically warns that some scam PACs appear registered. The red flag is in the spending. If the filings show most of the money going to "fundraising," "consulting," "compliance," or other administrative costs instead of actual campaign activity, walk away. The safest move is simpler still: donate only through a candidate's official website that you typed into your own browser.

Verify a political donation in 4 steps:

1. Go to fec.gov. Type it yourself; never use a link from the appeal.
2. Open the committee search and type the PAC's exact name as it appears in the message.
3. Open its filings and check where the money actually goes. Heavy "fundraising," "consulting," and admin costs are the scam signature the FBI calls out.
4. No match, or the spending looks wrong? Don't give through that appeal. Give on the official site you found yourself, or not at all.

This is the political donation scam's weak spot: it cannot survive two minutes of checking. The same habit defeats fake-charity appeals year-round. Our charity scams guide teaches the 2-minute check in full.

Scheme 3: The merchandise that never ships

How it plays. A website or social media ad sells hats, shirts, signs, and flags with a candidate's name and slogans. You order. You pay. Nothing ever arrives. The FBI classifies this one plainly: a classic non-delivery scam wearing a campaign costume.

Why it works. It feels like shopping, not donating. And the prices are small enough that many people never bother reporting a $25 shirt that never came. Scammers count on exactly that silence.

The tell. Before buying from an unfamiliar store, check reviews and complaints at BBB.org. Be wary of stores that appeared out of nowhere this month, have no contact information beyond a web form, or pressure you with countdown timers. And pay by credit card. It gives you dispute rights that wire transfers, gift cards, and cash apps don't. Non-delivery is no small crime type, either: the FBI's IC3 counted 56,478 non-payment/non-delivery complaints in 2025. Election merch is this season's costume on a year-round scam.

Scheme 4: The "you're not registered" text

How it plays. This is the voter registration scam, and it has the widest reach of the four. It doesn't need you to care about any race. A text or email arrives: you're not registered to vote in your state. Click here to fix it before it's too late. The link opens a page dressed up like your state's official voter registration site. Every detail you type in. Name, address, date of birth, sometimes more. Goes straight to criminals, who use it for identity theft and to target you with future scams.

Why it works. It borrows the one deadline nobody wants to miss. The message creates a small panic. what if I really am not registered?. And offers the fix in the same breath. Checking feels like the responsible thing to do, and the link makes it effortless.

The tell. Never check your registration through a link someone sent you. Open your own browser, type vote.gov yourself, and check there. Or go directly to your own state's official election office website, the one you find on your own. That single habit defeats this scheme completely. And if a suspicious text already arrived, paste it into our Scam Checker. It will give you a plain-English verdict on the message in seconds, and it's free.

Check your registration safely. 4 steps:

1. Open your browser and type vote.gov yourself. (Bookmark it. Future-you will thank present-you.)
2. Choose your state. Vote.gov sends you to your state's official election website.
3. On the state site, look for "check my registration" and enter the details it asks for. Name and date of birth are typical.
4. Read your status there and only there. If it says you're registered, the text was a lie. If it says you're not, you fix it on that official site. Safely.

Underneath the costume, this is plain phishing. And phishing is the most-reported crime type in America: the FBI's IC3 counted 191,561 phishing and spoofing complaints in 2025. Got the text? Forward it to 7726 (that spells SPAM) to report it to your phone carrier, then delete it.

Extra: when the candidate calls. And it isn't them

This section is extra context beyond the FBI's four schemes above. Not a fifth FBI scheme. The FBI's October alert carries a warning that belongs in bold: scammers now use AI tools to generate "highly realistic voices, images, and written messages that impersonate candidates, campaigns, government entities, and trusted contacts." A robocall in a candidate's perfect voice asking for an urgent donation. A video clip that looks exactly like a news interview. The realism, the FBI says, "makes these schemes harder for victims to detect."

The defense is the same one we teach for cloned grandchild voices: a familiar voice is no longer proof of identity. Hang up on the urgent call, then verify through a channel the caller doesn't control. The campaign's official site, typed by you. If you want the full playbook on how voice cloning works and how families defeat it, our guide to AI voice cloning scams covers it step by step.

Five rules before you give a dollar

1. Never click a link in an unsolicited political text, email, or message. Not to donate, not to check registration, not to "verify" anything. Go to the source yourself, every time.
2. Verify committees at fec.gov and registration at vote.gov. Typed by you, in your own browser. Bookmark both now, while nothing is urgent.
3. Donate only through official sites you reached on your own. Type the candidate's or organization's web address yourself. Treat every link that arrived uninvited as suspect.
4. Pay by credit card, never by wire, gift card, or cash app when giving online. Cards give you dispute rights; the other methods are gone the moment they leave.
5. Slow down the urgency. "Matching funds end tonight" and "we're $500 short" are pressure tactics. Real campaigns will still take your donation tomorrow. A scammer's pitch cannot survive a night's sleep, which is exactly why it demands an answer now.

Got a letter asking for money? Read it first.

Election season also fills mailboxes with fundraising letters. Some legitimate, some not, and some legitimate-looking letters from organizations you've never heard of. If a political appeal arrives by mail and something feels off, run it through our Letter Explainer: photograph the letter and get a plain-English breakdown of what it's really asking, what the fine print says, and whether the sender checks out. Before you write a single check.

I already gave. What now?

1. Call your bank or card company right now and ask about reversing the charge. Credit cards offer the strongest protections; wire transfers are a race measured in hours. Speed is your best asset.
2. If you paid by gift card, keep the physical card and the store receipt, and call the card company's number on the back immediately. Some balances can be frozen if the money hasn't moved. (Gift cards are a scammer favorite across every season. Our gift card scam guide covers the other scripts.)
3. If you handed over personal information on a fake registration page, treat it as identity-theft exposure: watch your accounts and credit reports closely, and consider a fraud alert with the credit bureaus.
4. Report it: the FBI at ic3.gov (the FBI specifically asks for the name used, contact details, payment method, and exactly what you were told), and the FTC at ReportFraud.ftc.gov.
5. Warn your circle. These schemes travel through friend networks. The "investment pool" literally asks victims to recruit. One honest conversation can stop the next three.

For the complete step-by-step recovery playbook. Protecting accounts, freezing credit, and reporting everywhere that counts. See our guide: Clicked a Scam Link? Do This Now. And hear this plainly: getting fooled by a professional operation wearing your candidate's face is not a character flaw. Reporting it is how you turn it back on them.

The real places to check. One per scheme

• Registration text: vote.gov. Check your own registration.
• Fake PAC: FEC committee search. Look up the committee by exact name.
• Fake store: go to the campaign's own official site, typed by you, and follow its store link.
• Fake investment pool: there is no check that makes it real. A donation never pays out. Report it at ReportFraud.ftc.gov or ic3.gov.
• Elder Fraud Hotline: 1-833-372-8311.

These links go to official sites from our own page. That is different from tapping a link inside a suspicious message, which is what this page warns you never to do.

Related guides

• “Not Registered to Vote” Text Scam. The registration-check text, the vote.gov check, and what to do.
• Fake Campaign “Investment” Pool. Why a donation is never an investment, and the guaranteed-returns tell.
• Is This PAC Real?. The two-minute FEC search check before you give.
• Campaign Merchandise Never Arrived?. The fake store that takes your order and your money.
• AI Voice Cloning Scams: "Grandma, It's Me". But It Isn't. The full playbook on cloned voices, including the family code word defense.
• Charity Scams: Check Before You Give. The 2-minute donation check that defeats scam PACs too.
• Investment & Crypto Scams. Why "guaranteed returns" is always the tell, campaign badge or not.
• QR Code Scams (Quishing). The other text-and-link trap aimed at phones, with the SSA's "Think Before You Scan" warning.
• The "Grandchild in Trouble" Phone Scam. Impersonation's original script, and why the AI version is harder.
• Birthday Gift Card Scams Targeting Grandparents. Every gift-card payment script to recognize on sight.
• Clicked a Scam Link? Do This Now. The full recovery playbook if money or information already changed hands.

Sources: FBI IC3 public service announcement, October 15, 2026. "Scammers Exploit 2026 U.S. Midterm Election to Perpetrate Multiple Fraud Schemes" (alert PSA261015-3; update to I-102924-PSA, October 29, 2024). Reporting: local FBI field office or ic3.gov. Voter registration: vote.gov. Committee filings: fec.gov. Consumer reporting: ReportFraud.ftc.gov. Last updated November 4, 2026.