Trump administration poised to expand Citizens United, remove more political spending barriers

Most people who follow politics closely agree that the wheels started coming off our electoral system after the landmark Supreme Court case Citizens United v. FEC, which ruled that laws restricting the political spending of corporations are inconsistent with the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment. It was the infamous "money is speech and corporations are people" argument.

The suit was the defining victory in a decades-long effort from the right to chip away at laws aimed at preventing the consolidation of political power and influence by a relatively small but very affluent class of individuals. Following the Supreme Court’s ruling, we witnessed a sudden surge in independent expenditure-only committees (aka dark money super PACs), where obscured donors and special interests could pour unlimited amounts of money into campaigns that endorse voting for specific candidates.

Because federal election laws prohibit these PACs from officially coordinating with campaigns, it gave the benefiting candidate plausible deniability for even the most distasteful and inaccurate attacks on their opponents. In 2022, Vice President JD Vance (then a Senator) led a Supreme Court challenge seeking to remove restrictions that prevent these megadonors from using national party committees to coordinate their limitless spending with candidates directly.

The Biden Justice Department was in the process of defending the restrictions. However, the Trump Justice Department has done an about-face and is urging the high court to strike down the restrictions, which amount to some of the few remaining limits on election spending. Its refusal to enforce the restrictions could lay the groundwork for a reversal by the high court.

Vance's lawsuit (filed jointly with the National Republican Senatorial and Congressional Committees) seeks to overturn the 2001 Supreme Court ruling in FEC v. Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Committee. That decision, ruling on a challenge to the 1971 Federal Election Campaign Act, limits party committees from coordinating spending with candidates.

It is crucial to note that the current limits for coordinated spending between national committees and candidates are already quite high—$32.3 million for presidential candidates, while limits vary by state for Senate and House candidates (in Vance’s home state of Ohio, Senate candidates are limited to $1,138,000). Removing these limits will open the floodgates completely.

In 2001, the Supreme Court rejected the Colorado state committee’s arguments that coordinated party spending limits are unconstitutional, reasoning that unlimited coordinated expenditures would make political parties an ideal way for donors to circumvent individual contribution limits.

However, this is a very different Supreme Court than it was in 2001 or even 2010, when Citizens United came before it. Trump’s three SCOTUS appointments—Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett—were not on the court in 2010. While Gorsuch and Kavanaugh replaced justices who voted with the 5-4 majority, Barrett replaced Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who was among the dissenting justices. Justice Clarence Thomas had opined in 2010 that Citizens United did not go far enough.

Recent actions of both the Supreme Court and the FEC also suggest a favorable environment for Vance and his co-plaintiffs. In 2014, the Supreme Court struck down aggregate limits on how much an individual could donate to candidates and committees. In 2022, it ruled that Senator Ted Cruz's (R-TX) campaign committee could repay him money he lent to it, plus interest. A recent FEC decision allowed Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) to merge his campaign committee with a super PAC, creating a joint fundraising committee with few restrictions.

In other words, if you believe that Citizens United was the worst thing to happen to modern politics, it looks like there are even darker days ahead. Of course, it cannot be understated that Congress could come together to cure the problem legislatively, had it not all but completely abdicated its role in our separation of powers.

Considering that President Trump is now targeting not only groups that fund his opponents but also individuals, removing barriers for his supporters while, at the very least, producing a chilling effect on large-scale Democratic donors could create an enormous advantage for Republicans in both the upcoming midterms and the 2028 presidential election.

At Trump’s urging, the Justice Department has directed federal prosecutors to investigate the Open Society Foundations, a philanthropic organization founded by George Soros, with a senior official instructing U.S. attorneys' offices in multiple jurisdictions to draft plans for an investigation. Trump has also accused Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn and a prominent Democratic Party donor, of being an "agitator" and "anarchist" who may be funding anti-government protests and "left-wing terrorism," suggesting he could face "problems."

Dennis "Mitch" Maley is an editor and columnist for The Bradenton Times and the host of our weekly podcast. With over two decades of experience as a journalist, he has covered Manatee County government since 2010. He is a graduate of Shippensburg University and later served as a Captain in the U.S. Army. Click here for his bio. Mitch is also the author of three novels and a short story collection available here. He can be reached at editor@thebradentontimes.com.