What is McCutcheon v. FEC?

McCutcheon v. FEC arose from a direct challenge to the Federal Election Campaign Act's aggregate biennial contribution limits -- the cumulative caps restricting how much any one donor could give to all federal candidates and political committees combined in a single two-year election cycle. Shaun McCutcheon, an Alabama businessman and Republican donor, wanted to give $1,776 each to 27 additional federal candidates in the 2011-12 cycle beyond the 16 he had already contributed to -- a plan that would have left him compliant with every base per-candidate limit but would have exceeded the applicable aggregate candidate cap. The Republican National Committee joined as co-plaintiff. The plaintiffs argued that the aggregate limits were unconstitutional under the First Amendment as interpreted in Buckley v. Valeo, 424 U.S. 1 (1976): once a donor complied with the base per-election limit for each individual candidate -- the amount Buckley found adequate to prevent quid pro quo corruption -- an additional aggregate cap served no legitimate anti-corruption purpose and simply restricted the number of candidates and committees a person could choose to support.

Chief Justice Roberts wrote the plurality opinion, joined by Kennedy, Scalia, and Alito. The plurality applied the 'closely drawn scrutiny' standard that Buckley established for contribution limits -- less exacting than strict scrutiny but more demanding than rational-basis review. Under that standard, contribution limits are valid only if they directly and materially advance the government's anti-corruption interest. Roberts held that the government's permissible anti-corruption interest is limited to preventing quid pro quo corruption -- a direct exchange of an official act for a contribution -- and does not extend to preventing 'general influence' or ensuring 'equal access.' The base limits already accomplish the quid pro quo prevention goal for any individual candidate: once a per-election cap ensures no donor can give more than the legal maximum directly to any single candidate, the aggregate cap only restricts how many candidates a donor may support, not how much the donor may give to each one. The plurality concluded that aggregate limits restricted First Amendment-protected political participation without a corresponding anti-corruption benefit, and struck them down. Justice Thomas concurred in the judgment but would have gone further: he argued the Court should overrule Buckley entirely, apply strict scrutiny to all contribution limits, and hold both base and aggregate limits unconstitutional.

Justice Breyer wrote the principal dissent, joined by Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan. The dissent argued that the plurality's narrow framing of 'corruption' as only quid pro quo exchange was inconsistent with Buckley and the broader anti-corruption rationale Congress invoked when enacting FECA's limits. Breyer emphasized the circumvention risk that aggregate limits were designed to address: without an aggregate cap, a wealthy donor could write a single check to a joint fundraising committee or a multi-candidate umbrella entity that would then distribute the money to dozens of candidates, effectively channeling far more indirect support to any one candidate than the per-election base limit permits for a direct contribution. The dissenters would have upheld the aggregate limits under Buckley's more permissive framework for contribution restrictions as a valid prophylactic measure against circumvention. The plurality responded that the base limits and FECA's coordination prohibition -- which converts a coordinated expenditure into a regulated contribution -- are adequate to prevent such circumvention, and that Congress may not restrict the breadth of a donor's political associations solely to reduce the aggregate amount of money that flows through elections.

For the 2028 presidential election, McCutcheon's elimination of aggregate contribution limits has concrete practical effects. A wealthy donor who supports a 2028 presidential nominee may now also contribute the per-election base limit -- adjusted by the FEC for inflation each election cycle under BCRA's indexing mechanism -- to every Senate candidate, every House candidate, and every party committee they wish to support, with no two-cycle cumulative ceiling. Joint fundraising committees -- multi-candidate fundraising vehicles that allow a single contribution to be divided among a presidential campaign, party committees, and other affiliated accounts according to a legally specified allocation -- can raise more per donor per fundraising event because aggregate limits no longer constrain the total across recipients. The per-election base limits on direct contributions to any single candidate's committee remain constitutional under Buckley and were not affected by McCutcheon. All contributions to candidate committees and party committees above $200 remain publicly disclosed at fec.gov under FECA's disclosure requirements, which the Supreme Court has consistently upheld as constitutional.