Supreme Court rules political party limits on campaign spending are unconstitutional

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled that federal limits on coordinated spending between political parties and their preferred candidates are unconstitutional, a decision with sweeping implications for this year’s midterm elections and beyond.The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) had mounted a First Amendment challenge in 2022 to the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971, arguing that it unconstitutionally capped so-called “coordinated funding expenditures,” which are mainly used for campaign advertising.The high court had upheld the expenditure limits in the 2001 case of FEC v.Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Committee, but the NRSC argued that events since that ruling — including the rise of Super PACs, changes in campaign finance law, and the court’s own decision in 2010’s Citizens United v.

FEC — had made the 2001 decision obsolete.The decision is one of the most consequential campaign finance-related cases to come before the court since Citizens United, which struck down limits on political spending by corporations.Proponents of nixing the coordinated funding limits had argued they weakened the power of the parties by making them subject to restrictions that did not apply to super PACs.“Republicans have achieved a major victory with coordinated spending limits being struck down, and they are in the driver’s seat because of their massive cash advantage,” Sean Cooksey, managing director at BGR Group and former Chairman of the Federal Election Commission, told The Post.“The GOP can now work with its candidates to buy more ads at cheaper prices to maintain their majorities this fall,” Cooksey, a former counsel to Vance, added.As of 2025, the limits, which the FEC adjusts for inflation each year and depend in part on the voting age population of each state, ranged from $127,200 to $3,946,100 for Senate candidates; $127,200 for House candidates in Alaska, Delaware, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming; and $63,6...