New statistics show that the Federal Election Commission has become “less aggressive” at enforcing the nation’s campaign finance laws than it was a few years ago, the most senior member of the agency said Thursday.

Democratic Commissioner Ellen Weintraub’s criticism came minutes before FEC members passed a new policy on exculpatory evidence, which she said could further hamper FEC investigations.

“The notion that we are a fierce investigative agency that people are quaking in their boots about is probably not the case. If it ever was the case, it certainly is not today,” she said during the FEC’s meeting Thursday.

Weintraub, who has been a commissioner since 2002, said a recent staff briefing on agency enforcement revealed huge drops in the size of fines levied.

From fiscal 2006 to 2010, the average fine levied against campaigns, parties and political action committees for violating campaign finance law dropped from $180,000 to $42,000, Weintraub said. Similarly, the number of conciliation agreements, deals on penalties hammered out between the FEC and those under investigation, fell from 91 in fiscal 2007 to 29 in fiscal 2010, which Weintraub called a “pretty sharp drop.”