5.11 SCOTUS Comparison: Citizens United

Alabama businessman Shaun McCutcheon contributed $33,088 to sixteen different candidates running for federal office in 2012. His donations exceeded the aggregate (total) campaign finance limit established by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) of 2002. This law limited the total amount of political contributions that an individual could make in a given two-year election period to federal candidates, federal political action committees, and political parties. In the subsequent case, McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission (2013), the Court ruled in a 5–4 decision that limits on the amount of political contributions established by the BCRA are unconstitutional. The Court held that “contributing money to a candidate is an exercise of an individual’s right to participate in the electoral process. . . . A restriction on how many candidates and committees an individual may support is hardly a ‘modest restraint’ on those rights. The government may no more restrict how many candidates or causes a donor may support than it may tell a newspaper how many candidates it may endorse.”