McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission

The Supreme Court’s 2014 decision in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission struck down the biennial aggregate limits on individual campaign contributions, removing the ceiling on the total dollar amount an individual could give across all federal candidates and committees in a two-year election cycle.

Legal Background

Federal Election Campaign Act Context: The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 (FECA), as amended by the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, imposed two types of contribution limits: base limits restricting donations to individual candidates or committees, and aggregate limits capping total contributions across all federal candidates and committees during a two-year election cycle.

Pre-McCutcheon Limits: For the 2013-2014 election cycle, the indexed aggregate limits restricted an individual to $48,600 in total contributions to federal candidates and$74,600 to all other committees, of which no more than $48,600 could go to committees other than national party committees, producing a combined ceiling of$123,200 for the two-year cycle.

Legal Challenge: Shaun McCutcheon and the Republican National Committee challenged these aggregate limits as violations of First Amendment free speech rights, arguing that base limits were sufficient to prevent corruption without restricting overall political participation.

Key Provisions

The Court divided 5-4 on the judgment. Chief Justice Roberts announced the judgment and wrote a plurality opinion joined by Justices Scalia, Kennedy, and Alito; Justice Thomas concurred in the judgment on separate reasoning. The plurality set out several principles:

Aggregate Limits Removal: Struck down the biennial aggregate contribution limits as unconstitutional under the First Amendment. Those limits capped the total dollar amount an individual could give across all federal candidates and committees in a two-year cycle. Removing the dollar ceiling means an individual may now give the full per-recipient base amount to as many candidates and committees as they choose; the number of recipients was never capped directly, only constrained by the dollar total.

Base Limits Preservation: Maintained existing base limits on contributions to individual candidates ($2,600 per election) and committees, distinguishing between anti-corruption measures (base limits) and speech restrictions (aggregate limits).

Joint Fundraising Expansion: Enabled expanded use of Joint Fundraising Committees (JFCs) that can now accept much larger contributions by combining multiple candidate and party committees under single fundraising operations.

First Amendment Framework: Declined to revisit whether contribution limits receive strict scrutiny, concluding that the aggregate limits fail even under the less demanding “closely drawn” test from Buckley v. Valeo because they do little to prevent circumvention of the base limits, and reiterating that preventing quid pro quo corruption or its appearance is the only interest sufficient to justify contribution limits.

What Changed for Contributors

The decision altered the arithmetic of individual giving rather than the rules governing any particular fundraising channel:

• Number of recipients: An individual may give to any number of federal candidates and committees in a cycle, where the biennial aggregate limits had previously capped that total
• Per-recipient ceilings: The base limits the plurality left intact continue to cap what any single candidate or committee may accept from one individual
• Joint fundraising committees: With no aggregate ceiling, a joint fundraising committee combining multiple candidate and party committees can accept a single contribution larger than the former aggregate limits allowed, so long as each committee’s share stays within its base limit

The Court’s opinion, the statute it construed, and the FEC’s limit schedule address contribution limits only; they make no findings about fundraising platforms or online giving.

Legal Challenges and Evolution

Constitutional Framework: The decision reinforced the Roberts Court’s approach of applying First Amendment scrutiny to campaign finance restrictions, following Citizens United v. FEC (2010).

Reporting and Enforcement: Contributions remain subject to the Federal Election Commission’s reporting requirements and to the per-recipient base limits, which the decision left in place.

Debate Over the Decision

• Donor Contribution Capacity: Individuals can distribute contributions across an unlimited number of candidates and committees, subject to per-recipient base limits
• The dissent’s position: Justice Breyer, joined by Justices Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan, argued that Buckley v. Valeo had upheld aggregate limits as a restraint on evasion of the base limits, and set out scenarios in which a single donor’s money could be routed toward one candidate in amounts far above the base limit once the aggregate cap was removed
• The plurality’s position: The plurality held that aggregate limits restrict participation without serving the quid pro quo anti-corruption interest that justifies base limits, and that existing earmarking rules and other anticircumvention safeguards already address the problem

McCutcheon v. FEC removed the biennial ceiling on an individual’s total federal contributions while preserving the per-recipient base limits, so a donor may give the full base amount to as many federal candidates and committees as they choose.