NRSC v. FEC
5-4
The Supreme Court's decision in NRSC v. FEC overturned limits on coordinated party expenditures, allowing political parties to spend unlimit
Key takeaways
- The decision allows political parties to act as vehicles for circumventing campaign contribution limits.
Main topics
- Campaign finance regulation
- First Amendment and money as speech
Notable quotes
Money is speech. That's the core argument behind this case.
Conclusion
The NRSC v. FEC decision marks another significant step in dismantling campaign finance safeguards, allowing
Transcript preview
Speaker 2 (0:00) We will hear argument this morning in case 24-621, National Republican Senatorial Committee versus the Federal Election Commission. Speaker 2 (0:13) Hey, everyone. This is Leon from Prologue Projects. On this week's episode of 5 to 4, Peter, Rhiannon, and Michael are talking about National Republican Sanitorial Committee v. Federal Election Commission, or if you prefer that in letters instead of words, NRSC v. FEC. It's a case from this past term in which the court overturned a law capping how much money political parties can spend in direct coordination with individual candidates. In effect, the ruling creates a workaround for donors who want to give more money to a candidate than they're legally allowed to. You have now coordinated spending that functions like a contribution. Political parties can sort of almost become vehicles for circumventing contribution limits. It's the latest in a long line of cases in which the court has sought to undo decades of good governance laws aimed at reining in the influence of money in politics. This is 5 to 4. a podcast about how much the Supreme Court sucks. Speaker 3 (1:21) Welcome to 5 to 4, where we dissect and analyze the Supreme Court cases that have hidden away our civil liberties, like Donald Trump hiding in a catering cart. I'm Peter. I'm here with Rhiannon. Hey, Speaker 1 (1:32) everybody. And Speaker 4 (1:33) Michael. Must have been a big catering cart. He's not a small guy. He's Speaker 1 (1:37) not a tiny person. Yeah. Right. They have the President Crouching. Speaker 3 (1:40) He must have been balled up. Most people probably heard the story by now, but Donald Trump, in order to avoid Speaker 3 (1:50) assassination presumably boarded air force one wave to the cameras yeah and then they snuck him off to another plane on a catering cart like he hid inside yeah a catering cart insanely funny veep level stuff like rather than get the plane to just like the the point where it's like we're 100 sure that right Iran's not going to blow this up right now, sir. Someone is like, what if we snuck you out with the cookies? I honestly bet that he just liked that idea too much. Oh, he loved it. He was like, that's so fun. That's Speaker 1 (2:25) his favorite part of being the president is little tricks. He thinks he's playing on everybody. Speaker 3 (2:30) So yeah, he presumably huddled up inside a catering cart and then they put him on another plane. Speaker 4 (2:37) But that also means he left like a bunch of staffers in like the entire White House press corps. there as decoys to possibly get bombed by Iran. Speaker 3 (2:47) There's a timeline where that plane gets bombed by Iran and then everyone's like, oh my God, the president has been killed. And then Trump shows up on TV. And Speaker 1 (2:55) he's like, uh-uh. Speaker 3 (2:57) Imagine the feeling that you would have when he pops back up. Yeah. In the press room. Speaker 4 (3:02) I Speaker 3 (3:02) snuck out in a catering Speaker 4 (3:03) cart. Speaker 3 (3:03) Yeah, he's Speaker 1 (3:03) like, I outsmarted them. I knew it was coming. Oh my Speaker 4 (3:07) God, Speaker 3 (3:07) we would never hear the Speaker 4 (3:08) end of it. Speaker 3 (3:09) Today's case, National Republican Senatorial Committee versus the Federal Election Commission, NRSE, BFEC. This is a case from the end of this past term about campaign finance. Specifically, it is about political candidates coordinating with political parties. The Federal Election Campaign Act is a law from the early 1970s that sought to regulate campaign finance. Part of that law was a cap on coordinated party expenditures. What that means is that political parties are allowed to spend their money in coordination with political candidates, but there is a limit on how much. Yes. We are talking about that limit. So if the Republicans want to coordinate some ads with a Republican candidate of their choice, for example, they can, but they can't pass that threshold. There's a cap on how much they can spend. The point of this is first to avoid allowing donors to end run around campaign contribution limits by just like sending their donations to the party. Speaker 2 (4:07) And Speaker 3 (4:07) then also you have broader concerns about corruption, right? The whole reason campaign contribution limits exist is because without them, large donors might be able to dictate what a candidate says and does. Speaker 2 (4:18) Believe Speaker 3 (4:19) it or not, there was a time when people in Congress thought that might be a bad thing. Right. And they passed this law. But the Supreme Court in a six to three decision said this all sounds like it violates the First Amendment. Yes. Speaker 1 (4:32) What about our speech? What Speaker 3 (4:33) about the speech of the Republican Party? Speaker 1 (4:35) What about our speech and how our money is speech and how that's really, really important? And we take one or even two cases a term, it feels like, about our money being. Speaker 3 (4:47) our speech. Can they just take one case and be like, campaign finance laws don't exist anymore so that we don't have to do two of these a year? Absolutely. Speaker 1 (4:54) It's like bit by bit, like we knew this was coming, this holding about this, but it's so specific. We knew it was coming because Citizens United said this, you know? Speaker 4 (5:04) Disagree with my co-hosts. These are two cases a year where that we have labs that we get to just... Speaker 4 (5:10) Recycle the same talking points. You're right. I take Speaker 1 (5:12) it back. It's content and we appreciate all content in this house. All right. Let's start with the law. The Federal Election Campaign Act regulates campaign finance and the provision of the law that's at issue in this case is one that regulates what are called coordinated party expenditures. OK, if you're not a campaign finance expert, you're not always wheeling and dealing in this ridiculous. eyes glazed over vocabulary. Think of campaign finance as happening with like different kinds of transactions, two categories of transactions. There are contributions, which of course is like what a donor or a PAC or a party can contribute to a candidate's campaign. And then there are expenditures, which is what a PAC or a party or what have you can expend, can spend on a campaign. So this provision in the Federal Election Campaign Act allows party committees, that's like the DNC. the RNC, to make what are called coordinated party expenditures, but only up to certain amounts, like you just said, Peter. So coordinated party expenditures, these are expenditures or spending that benefits the election campaigns of federal candidates, and it's coordinated with those candidates, meaning the candidate can give input on how that money is spent. So a party can contribute to a candidate's campaign, and they can also spend. on a candidate's campaign and they can do so in a coordinated way where the candidate has input on how the party spends that money. So these coordinated party expenditures like often look like campaign advertising that the party committee is paying for, but it's in coordination with the candidate. The candidate might say, you know, I'm thinking about ads in this place or I'm thinking about an ad that highlights this issue or what have you. Right. So. Prior to this case, those coordinated expenditures from the party to a candidate's campaign were capped at certain amounts. In 2024, for example, the last presidential election, the coordinated party expenditure limit for nominees for president in the general election coming from those national party committees was just over $32 million. The coordinated party expenditure limit for a House candidate in 2026 this year is between $65,000 and $130,000. Meanwhile, the coordinated party expenditure limit for a Senate candidate this year is between about $130,000 and $4 million. In that case, that range depends on the state's voting age population where that Senate candidate is running. That was the status quo, though, before this case. We're talking about a lot of money, but we are talking about some limits that federal election campaign finance law had in place. That's what the law said. But now, because of this case and because of all the cases that came before it, you have money in elections designated as free speech. And now you have this court, these six up on the court. Waiting for cases like this to come up. So clocking all of that, clocking this new context that we're in today. Back in 2022, where the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee, former Republican Ohio Representative Steve Chabot and then Senator J.D. Vance. That year, 2022, this polycule. filed a lawsuit saying these limits on coordinated party expenditures are unconstitutional because, say it with me, money is speech. I'm Speaker 3 (8:50) trying to talk here. The Speaker 1 (8:51) case, therefore, makes its way to the Supreme Court, another arm of the polycule, you might say. But one interesting note here, just about the parties, before we get into the opinion and what the court decides, these Republicans and the Republican Party committees. Speaker 1 (9:09) sue the FEC, the Federal Election Commission, because the FEC is the federal agency that enforces these campaign laws. Now, since the FEC is a federal agency, defending that federal agency in that lawsuit would, of course, be the federal government. For example, the Solicitor General of the United States. But... Since the federal government at this time, i.e. the Trump administration, agrees with these guys who are suing, they say, actually, we're not going to argue against this. We're not going to represent the FEC to defend its enforcement of these laws because we agree that the law is unconstitutional. Speaker