A campaign turns your private life public. Get your home address down before you announce.

Federal campaign-finance filings require an address for the candidate and for each donor giving more than the itemization threshold ($200 for federal). That address becomes part of the public record, and many states have similar rules at the state-office level. There's typically no opt-out: running for office means some address information becomes public by law. The privacy work focuses on what's still in your control: broker sites, social media, and search results.

Two reasons. FEC filings sit in a structured database that takes some effort to search. Broker sites publish the same address in a format built for casual search, no research skill required. FEC also publishes only your current address, while broker sites publish your full address history, your family members' addresses, and your past workplaces, far more than disclosure law requires.

Not as a privacy move. Residency requirements for political office are strict and tied to your actual life. State Address Confidentiality Programs (ACPs) for documented victims of stalking or domestic violence are the legitimate path for shielding home addresses on public records. For most candidates without that documented basis, the available privacy work is the broker-layer cleanup.

Yes, often more than you. Documented attacks on political figures since 2020 have frequently targeted family members. In the 2025 Hortman case, the shooter used people-search sites to track down victims, including former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman. Family-plan coverage lets your spouse and adult children remove their own broker-published data alongside yours.

Three to six months before the announcement is the comfortable window. Removal confirmations usually arrive within 7 to 30 days, and we run monthly full scans after that to catch anything that resurfaces. By the time you announce, the broker-side cleanup is settled.