What Happens When The FEC Can’t Do Its Job?

Welcome to a special edition of FiveThirtyEight’s weekly politics chat. The transcript below has been lightly edited.

sarahf (Sarah Frostenson, politics editor): Last Monday, Federal Election Commission Vice Chairman Matthew Petersen announced his resignation, leaving the FEC effectively shut down, as only three positions on the six-seat committee are currently filled and the agency is legally required to have four commissioners to be fully operational.

What this means is that the agency responsible for both enforcing and advising on the nation’s campaign-finance laws is out of commission for the foreseeable future. And because we’re in the middle of a presidential election … things could get hairy fast.

The FEC has said that it will soldier on, continuing to process filings and other reports, and has called on President Trump to nominate new commissioners and for the Senate to confirm them quickly. But Congress is still in recess and Trump has yet to move forward with appointing new commissioners (remember, there are now three vacancies).