National Republican Senatorial Committee v. Federal Election Comm’n

11 (Slip Opinion), OCTOBER TERM, 2025

1NOTE: When feasible, the Court releases a syllabus, or headnote, when it issues an opinion, as it has done here. The syllabus is not part of the Court’s opinion. The Reporter of Decisions prepared it to help readers. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co. SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

1NATIONAL REPUBLICAN SENATORIAL COMMITTEE

1ET AL. v. FEDERAL ELECTION COMMISSION ET AL.

1CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR

1THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

1No. 24–621. Argued December 9, 2025. Decided June 30, 2026.

1The Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) limits a political party’s

1spending on campaign activities coordinated with candidates. 52 U. S. C. §30116(d). In 2001, the Court held that these coordinated-expenditure limits were consistent with the First Amendment. See Federal Election Comm’n v. Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm. (Colorado II). Petitioners, a group of candidates and political party committees, challenged FECA’s limits on political-party coordinated expenditures under the First Amendment. They argued that Colorado II is no longer good law. In light of Colorado II, the full U. S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit rejected their challenge. This Court granted certiorari.

1Held: FECA’s limits on political-party coordinated expenditures violate the

1First Amendment. Pp. 6–26.

1(a) The Court has jurisdiction under Article III. When the lawsuit began, at least one plaintiff, then-Senate candidate JD Vance, undisputedly had standing, meaning a sufficient personal stake to sue. Vice President Vance still has an active “Statement of Candidacy” filed with the FEC that states his intent to run for Senate in 2028. He also has a campaign committee that has raised money for a Senate race. These facts show that a court can still decide the dispute. Pp. 5–6.

1(b) The First Amendment says that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech.” The Court has held that political parties, candidates, private individuals, and outside groups may make unlimited independent expenditures during political campaigns. See Buckley v. Valeo (per curiam). This case concerns FECA’s limits on spending by political

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2parties in coordination with candidates. Pp. 6–21.

2(1) FECA limits political-party expenditures coordinated with candidates. These limits restrict parties’ traditional communications, such as advertisements; prevent parties from strengthening their supporters’ voices; add financial costs and burdens; and have a “stifling effect on the ability of the party to do what it exists to do.” Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm. v. Federal Election Comm’n (opinion of Kennedy, J.). Pp. 7–8.

2(2) Laws limiting contributions to candidates or parties receive “closely drawn” scrutiny. McCutcheon v. Federal Election Comm’n (plurality opinion). Under that standard, a regulation cannot be “disproportionate” and must be “necessary” and “narrowly tailored” to its asserted goal. McCutcheon; Federal Election Comm’n v. Ted Cruz for Senate. The Court must examine: (i) the Government’s asserted interests in the limits and (ii) how well the limits fit those interests. McCutcheon; see also Cruz. The political-party coordinated-expenditure limits fail this test. Pp. 8–10.

2(3) To review FECA’s limits on political-party coordinated expenditures, the Court first considers the government interests claimed to justify them. The Court’s precedents recognize only one constitutionally allowed purpose for campaign-finance restrictions: “preventing corruption or the appearance of corruption.” McCutcheon. Congress may address only one specific kind, “‘quid pro quo’ corruption.” McCutcheon. Especially important here, the Court has recognized a risk of quid pro quo corruption or its appearance when a donor earmarks contributions to a political party, meaning the contributions “are directed, in some manner, to a candidate or officeholder.” McCutcheon.

2The First Amendment issue is whether FECA may limit political-party coordinated expenditures to prevent people from avoiding the base limits on candidate contributions by earmarking party contributions. Colorado II said yes. But Colorado II applied deferential review to Congress’s limits. Since then, the Court has stressed that review under the closely drawn test must be “rigorous.” McCutcheon. Under this more demanding standard, the Court agrees with petitioners that the limits are not proportionate, necessary, and narrowly tailored because the Government has other tools that restrict less speech and can prevent

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3circumvention. In particular, those tools include earmarking and disclosure laws. Under FECA, when an individual’s party contributions are “in any way earmarked or otherwise directed through an intermediary or conduit” to a federal candidate, they count “as contributions from such person to such candidate” and therefore fall under the candidate-contribution limits. 52 U. S. C. §30116(a)(8). McCutcheon explained that earmarking rules are a targeted and constitutionally permitted way to prevent avoidance of those limits. As JUSTICE THOMAS explained, “Vigilant enforcement” of earmarking rules is a more “precise response” to any “circumvention concerns.” Colorado II (dissenting opinion).

3As for disclosure laws, FECA requires political parties and candidates to publicly report the contributions they receive and their campaign spending, including coordinated expenditures. §30104(b). McCutcheon stressed that “modern technology,” especially the Internet, has made disclosure a much stronger tool against circumvention over time.

3Importantly, the base contribution limits, earmarking rules, and disclosure requirements work together to protect the Government’s interest in preventing circumvention without placing an undue limit on core political-party speech. Because meaningful preventive measures are available against quid pro quo corruption or its appearance, the Court concludes that these political-party coordinated-expenditure limits are “disproportionate” and are not “necessary” and “narrowly tailored” to the anti-circumvention interest. McCutcheon; Cruz. Pp. 10–21.

3(c) Amicus and the intervenors argue that stare decisis, the principle of following precedent, requires the Court to follow Colorado II. But the Court’s more recent precedents have rejected Colorado II’s reasoning, so it is no longer good law. To the extent Colorado II still has any legal force, the Court now overrules it. Pp. 21–26.

3The Court reversed the judgment reported at 117 F. 4th 389 and sent the case back for further proceedings.

3Justice KAVANAUGH wrote the Court’s opinion. Chief Justice ROBERTS and Justices THOMAS, ALITO, GORSUCH, and BARRETT joined it. Justice KAGAN wrote a dissenting opinion, joined by Justices SOTOMAYOR and JACKSON.

4JUSTICE KAVANAUGH delivered the Court’s opinion. The First Amendment, ratified in 1791, says that “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech.” The Federal Election Campaign Act, or FECA, limits how much political parties may spend on campaigns. Those limits necessarily restrict the parties’ speech because nearly every way of communicating ideas to a mass audience costs money. Limiting campaign spending therefore reduces how much parties can say, how many issues they can discuss, how deeply they can discuss them, and how many people they can reach. See Buckley v. Valeo.

4Under the First Amendment, the Court has long held that a political party may make unlimited independent campaign expenditures, meaning spending that is not coordinated with a candidate. See Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm. v. Federal

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5Election Comm’n, Colorado I. JUSTICE BREYER’s controlling opinion addressed this issue.

5But FECA still limits a political party’s coordinated expenditures. These include party spending on advertisements produced or distributed after consultation with a candidate’s campaign. The main current reason for these limits is to prevent circumvention. In other words, they seek to stop a donor from avoiding the legal limits on direct candidate contributions by giving a large amount to a party, which then uses the money to support a particular candidate.

5Some 25 years ago, in Colorado II, the Court upheld FECA’s limits on coordinated spending by political parties. JUSTICE THOMAS dissented for four Justices. A group of candidates and political committees recently filed a new lawsuit arguing that Colorado II is no longer valid or should be overruled. They rely on major changes in the Court’s First Amendment campaign-finance decisions since 2001; stronger government tools against circumvention, especially earmarking and disclosure laws; and political parties’ reduced power compared with outside groups over the last 25 years, which they say weakens a key premise of Colorado II. See McCutcheon v. Federal Election Comm’n; Federal Election Comm’n v. Ted Cruz for Senate; and SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Comm’n. Because of these legal and factual changes since 2001, the United States agrees with plaintiffs that Colorado II is no longer viable. The Government therefore does not defend the constitutionality of the political-party coordinated

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6expenditure limits. The Court also agrees with plaintiffs and now holds that FECA’s limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures violate the First Amendment.

6I. FECA restricts a political party’s coordinated expenditures, meaning party spending on campaign activities done in coordination with candidates. 52 U. S. C. §30116(d). The limits differ by State and by office. A national party committee may spend from $130,600 to $4,071,800 in coordination with one Senate candidate and from $65,300 to $130,600 with one House candidate. 91 Fed. Reg. 10393–10394 (2026). In the most recent Presidential election, a national party committee could spend $32,392,200 in coordination with a Presidential candidate. 89 Fed. Reg. 5536 (2024).

6In 2001, the Court held that the limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures were consistent with the First Amendment. Nearly a generation later, in 2022, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee, then-candidate for Senate JD Vance, and then-Representative Steve Chabot

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61. FEC regulations define a coordinated expenditure as money spent “in cooperation, consultation or concert with, or at the request or suggestion of, a candidate.” 11 CFR §109.20(a) (2025). See also 52 U. S. C. §30101(17), which defines an “independent expenditure” as spending by a person that “(A) expressly advocat[es] the election or defeat of a clearly identified candidate; and (B) . . . is not made in concert or cooperation with or at the request or suggestion of such candidate.”

62. The two major political parties have six authorized national committees: the Republican National Committee, the Democratic National Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee. See 11 CFR §§110.1(c)(2), 110.2(c)(2), 110.3(b)(2).

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7sued the Federal Election Commission and its Commissioners. They claimed that the limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures violate the First Amendment. Plaintiffs argued that political parties have a First Amendment right to spend money as they choose on political ads and other campaign activities, including in coordination with their candidates.

7The full U. S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit rejected plaintiffs’ challenge and upheld FECA’s limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures under the Court’s 2001 decision in Colorado II. But in several opinions, a majority of the Sixth Circuit judges questioned that precedent in light of the Court’s newer First Amendment decisions, especially McCutcheon v. Federal Election Comm’n and Federal Election Comm’n v. Ted Cruz for Senate. See 117 F. 4th 389, 395 (CA6 2024) (en banc) (Sutton, C. J.); id., at 401 (Thapar, J., concurring); id., at 407 (Bush, J., concurring); id., at 447 (Readler, J., dissenting).

7The Court agreed to decide whether, after McCutcheon, Cruz, and the Court’s other recent decisions, the statutory limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures remain consistent with the First Amendment. 606 U. S. 931 (2025). Before this Court, the United States agrees with plaintiffs that FECA’s limits are no longer constitutional. The Democratic National Committee, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee intervened in the case and argue that the limits remain constitutional. Because of the Government’s position, the Court appointed Roman Martinez as amicus curiae to

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8defend the Sixth Circuit’s judgment and the constitutionality of the limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures. He performed those responsibilities well.

8II. Before deciding the merits, the Court must confirm that it has jurisdiction under Article III. When the lawsuit began, at least one plaintiff, then-candidate for Senate JD Vance, undisputedly had standing, meaning a sufficient legal interest, to challenge the restriction on coordinated expenditures. But the amicus and intervenors argue that the case is now moot, meaning there is no longer a live dispute.

8First, the amicus and intervenors argue that the Vice President no longer faces a credible threat of enforcement if his campaign coordinates with a political party that spends more than the statutory limits. The Executive Branch has concluded that the limits are unconstitutional, so the Federal Election Commission presumably will no longer enforce them. Cf. Susan B. Anthony List v. Driehaus.

8But FECA also allows private lawsuits in some circumstances when the FEC fails to act. 52 U. S. C. §§30109(a)(1), (a)(8)(A), (a)(8)(C). The threat of private enforcement is credible enough that the dispute “is still very much alive.” Chafin v. Chafin.

8Second, amicus and intervenors argue that the case is moot because Vice President Vance is no longer a candidate for office. Although then-Senator Vance may once have planned to seek Senate re-election in 2028, they say the now-Vice President has no “concrete and definite plans to run for any specific federal office” in the future. Therefore, they argue, FECA’s political

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9party limits on coordinated expenditures will not apply to him. Brief for Court-Appointed Amicus Curiae 13.

9But the Court does not need to guess whether Vice President Vance will run for office again. He still has an active “Statement of Candidacy” filed with the FEC stating that he intends to run for Senate in 2028. He also has a principal campaign committee, JD Vance for Senate, that has raised money for a Senate race. For purposes of deciding whether a court may hear the case, the Court cannot ignore that statement and existing committee. They show that the case is not moot.

9The Court therefore considers the First Amendment issue.

9III. The Court begins with basic First Amendment principles. The First Amendment says, “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech.” It reflects “a profound national commitment” to open, vigorous, and unrestricted debate about public issues. Colorado I (Kennedy, J., concurring in the judgment and dissenting in part).

9Free-speech protection under the First Amendment applies most fully and urgently to campaigns for political office. Ted Cruz for Senate. For campaign spending, Buckley v. Valeo’s central holding is that people must be allowed to spend money on their own speech. Colorado I (opinion of Kennedy, J.). Therefore, the Court has ruled that political parties, candidates, private individuals, and outside groups may make unlimited independent expenditures during political

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10campaigns. See Buckley v. Valeo; Colorado I (opinion of Breyer, J.).

10This case concerns FECA’s limits on political parties spending money in coordination with candidates. For example, after discussing an advertisement’s content, timing, or placement with a candidate’s campaign, a party might pay to produce and air a television advertisement supporting that candidate.

10A. In tension with the First Amendment’s text, FECA limits coordinated expenditures by political parties. It therefore restricts parties from speaking in support of their own candidates during campaigns. Understanding how serious this First Amendment problem is requires understanding the important, traditional role of political parties in campaigns.

10Political parties state policy positions and platforms, choose candidates through primaries or caucuses, and support those candidates in general elections. Because a party’s success largely depends on whether its candidates win, parties and candidates naturally work and consult together during elections. Colorado II (THOMAS, J., dissenting). Justice Kennedy explained that it would be impractical and unwise for a party to support its candidates without some “cooperation” or “consultation.” Colorado I. Candidates are needed to make the party’s message known and effective, and the party does the same for candidates.

10During a campaign, coordination between a party and a candidate may cover what political activities and messages to use, when and where to use them, how to use them, and

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11who should receive political activities and messages. Coordination may address which policies the party and candidate should adopt and emphasize; when and where to run ads; what party ads, candidate ads, and candidate and surrogate speeches should say; which voters to target; how to use social media; how to avoid repeating the same work; and how best to encourage voting. Those are only some examples.

11Because campaigns involve these daily activities, parties and candidates have traditionally coordinated. That coordination has been “the essence of our Nation’s party system of government.” Colorado II (THOMAS, J., dissenting). For nearly 200 years after the First Amendment was ratified, parties could freely spend money to support and coordinate with their candidates during campaigns. No one argues that those elections failed to work or were corrupted. But modern congressional limits on coordinated party expenditures restrict both coordination and party speech. They weaken traditional party communications such as ads, prevent parties from strengthening their supporters’ voices, add financial costs and burdens, and have a “stifling effect” on parties’ ability to fulfill their purpose. Colorado I (opinion of Kennedy, J.); Colorado II (THOMAS, J., dissenting).

11B. Based on the First Amendment’s text and history, the restriction on coordinated expenditures by political parties would therefore appear unconstitutional. But the Court’s precedents,

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12especially Colorado II in 2001, make the issue less clear and require a more detailed and careful analysis.

12The Court’s precedents begin with a basic rule: when the Government restricts speech, it must prove that its action is constitutional. McCutcheon. Limits on campaign expenditures for political speech are allowed only in extremely rare cases when they advance a compelling interest and use the “least restrictive means” of doing so.

12The Court has held that statutory limits on contributions to candidates or parties, unlike limits on expenditures, receive “closely drawn” scrutiny. This is a nominally lower but still demanding level of review. The Government must show a sufficiently important interest and use means “closely drawn” to that interest.

12In recent cases including McCutcheon and Cruz, the Court emphasized that a regulation can pass closely drawn scrutiny only if it is not “disproportionate” and is “necessary” and “narrowly tailored” to its stated goal. McCutcheon said that a law must avoid “unnecessary” restrictions on speech, be “narrowly tailored” to its objective, and not be “disproportionate to the Government’s interest.” Cruz said the law must be “necessary for the interest it seeks to protect.”

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13But which test applies here does not ultimately matter. Whether the Court uses strict scrutiny or Buckley’s “closely drawn” test, it must examine (i) the Government’s asserted interests in imposing these limits and (ii) how well the limits fit those interests. McCutcheon; see also Cruz. As the Court will explain, the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures fail even the closely drawn test. So the Court need not focus on subtle differences between the two tests.

13C. To analyze FECA’s limits on political-party coordinated expenditures, the Court must examine the Government’s asserted interests for this restriction on political parties’ freedom of speech.

13Four possible governmental interests have been identified to justify the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures. The Court will consider each one.

13First, in 1974, Congress created the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures to reduce what it viewed as wasteful and excessive campaign spending. Colorado I (opinion of Breyer, J.). But the Court need not spend much time on that interest because no one invokes or defends it here. Nor could anyone do so. That interest is plainly not a permitted reason to restrict speech. The Court has consistently held that Congress may not limit campaign spending merely to “reduce the amount of money in politics.” Cruz; see also Buckley. Congress may not decide how much political speech or spending on speech is too much. It also may not restrict campaign spending to make electoral competition more equal or to increase or decrease the relative influence of certain groups or views. Cruz. The “concept that government may restrict

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14the speech of some elements of our society in order to enhance the relative voice of others is wholly foreign to the First Amendment.” Buckley.

14In short, Congress’s original reason for limiting political-party coordinated expenditures is completely inadequate under the First Amendment. Compare Kennedy v. Bremerton School Dist., which states that government reasons for interfering with First Amendment rights must not be invented after the fact in response to a lawsuit.

14Second, someone might argue that the Government has an interest in preventing a political party, as opposed to donors, from having too much influence over its candidates. But the amicus, a nonparty who assists the court, and the intervenors, parties who joined the case, do not defend the limits on that ground. They have good reason not to. That theory does not “make any sense” because parties and their candidates are deeply connected. 117 F. 4th 389, 402 (CA6 2024) (en banc) (Thapar, J., concurring). As JUSTICE THOMAS briefly explained, a political party’s influence over its candidates and officials “is not corruption.” It is the “successful advocacy of ideas in the political marketplace and representative government in a party system.” Colorado I (opinion concurring in judgment and dissenting in part).

14Third, in 2001, Colorado II partly justified the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures with a new theory focused on donors. Under that theory, the limits reduce a donor’s “undue influence on an officeholder’s judgment, and the appearance of such influence.” See also McCutcheon (Breyer, J., dissenting), noting that Colorado II upheld the limits as a way to prevent “undue influence by wealthy donors.”

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15But in later cases, especially McCutcheon and Cruz, the Court directly rejected undue influence as a valid reason for the Government to regulate campaign finances and limit political speech. Those newer cases clearly and firmly state that Congress may not restrict spending because of the possibility that political parties, individuals, or outside groups that spend “large sums may garner influence over or access to elected officials.” McCutcheon. Congress also may not restrict spending “to limit the appearance of mere influence or access.” Speech regulations may not target “general gratitude.” The Court explained that ingratiation and access “are not corruption.” Instead, they are a central part of democracy: constituents support candidates who share their beliefs and interests, and elected candidates can be expected to respond to those concerns.

15The Court now recognizes “only one legitimate governmental interest for restricting campaign finances: preventing corruption or the appearance of corruption.” McCutcheon. Congress may target only one specific kind of corruption: “quid pro quo” corruption. That means contributions given in exchange for official action. The Latin phrase describes a direct trade of money for an official act. The key sign of corruption is this financial exchange: dollars for political favors.

15Although the boundary between quid pro quo corruption and general influence may sometimes seem unclear, the Court must respect that difference to protect basic First Amendment rights. McCutcheon. When drawing that line, the First Amendment requires the Court to favor protecting political speech rather than suppressing it.

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16In short, under the Court’s more recent First Amendment decisions, the Government may not use campaign-finance restrictions to prevent or reduce influence, efforts to gain favor, gratitude, access, or the like for those who spend money to support, or contribute to, political parties or candidates. Therefore, those reasons can no longer justify the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures.

16Fourth, Colorado II also relied on the goal of preventing people from getting around contribution limits. The theory works this way: An individual donor seeking quid pro quo corruption, meaning donating to a candidate in exchange for that candidate’s official action when in office, might give the candidate’s political party large contributions above the existing limits on contributions to candidates. The party might then spend that money in coordination with the candidate to support the candidate’s campaign.

16Colorado II concluded that limits on political-party coordinated expenditures help prevent people from getting around the contribution limits.

16But the Court has since moved away from that reasoning. As McCutcheon later stressed, this claimed way around the limits is one significant step removed from actual quid pro quo corruption, which is a donor contributing to a candidate in exchange for official action.

16That is because the donor gives money to a political party, not to the candidate. This difference matters. McCutcheon recognized that the risk of quid pro quo corruption is not the same when money reaches a candidate through independent actors as when a donor gives directly to the candidate. After the donor gives to the party, the party is legally and practically free to use the money as it chooses, presumably to support candidates who are most likely to win, are in the closest races, or align

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17among other possibilities, the one most closely connected with the party. The party does not have to spend the money on the candidate chosen by the donor.

17Political parties and their candidates often work closely together, as explained above. That is how political parties and campaigns operate. But their interests are not the same. A party has broader and more spread-out interests. It often may focus at the same time on many candidates, policy proposals, ballot initiatives, efforts to get out the vote, advertising, and similar activities, rather than only one candidate’s campaign. If a donor’s contributions to a party are later redirected to a particular candidate, the party, not the donor, decides to do that. As a result, it is harder to attribute the support to the donor, and any credit must be shared among the people involved. Amicus and intervenors answer that limits on coordinated expenditures by political parties are still needed to prevent evasion because a donor might direct or require a party to use the donor’s contribution to support a particular candidate. This practice is called “earmarking.”

17That is a serious argument. The Court has recognized a risk of quid pro quo corruption, meaning an exchange of something valuable for official action, or the appearance of such corruption, when a donor’s contributions are earmarked. That means the contributions are directed in some way to a candidate or officeholder. The plaintiffs do not dispute that the Government has a constitutionally sufficient interest in restricting earmarked funds that exceed the contribution limits. Brief for Petitioners 21–24; Tr. of Oral Arg. 37.

17So the First Amendment question ultimately is whether FECA’s limits on political-party coordinated expenditures are allowed as a way to prevent evasion of the base contribution limits to

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18candidates through large contributions to parties that are earmarked, meaning directed, to a candidate?

18In Colorado II, the Court held that the limits were allowed. Plaintiffs respond that, since 2001, the Court’s First Amendment cases have changed substantially. They also say the Government now has other tools that restrict less speech and can prevent evasion through earmarking, including earmarking and disclosure laws. Because of those developments, plaintiffs argue that the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures are now unconstitutional.

18First, Colorado II gave Congress considerable leeway when reviewing limits on political-party coordinated expenditures as a way to prevent evasion. The opinion did not mention “narrow tailoring” or say the restriction had to be “necessary” and not “disproportionate” to the anti-circumvention interest. Instead, the Court said Congress was “entitled to its choice” among alternatives and that it would not “throw out” the limits because of “unskillful tailoring.” Since Colorado II, the Court has taken a much different approach. It has stressed that even under the closely drawn test, judicial review must be “rigorous.” Campaign-finance restrictions cannot be “disproportionate” and must be “necessary” and “narrowly tailored” to serve the Government’s stated interest. McCutcheon said a law must avoid an “unnecessary” restriction of speech to survive “rigorous” review, must be “narrowly tailored” to meet its goal, and cannot be “disproportionate to the Government’s interest.” Cruz said the law must be “necessary for the interest it seeks to protect.”

18Under those stricter standards, plaintiffs argue that the limits on political-party coordinated expenditures are

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19not proportionate, necessary, and narrowly tailored because the Government has other tools that restrict less speech and can prevent evasion, especially earmarking and disclosure laws.

19We therefore must examine the details of earmarking and disclosure laws more closely.

19As to earmarking laws, FECA treats an individual’s contributions to a party that are “in any way earmarked or otherwise directed through an intermediary or conduit” to a federal candidate as contributions from that individual to that candidate. The contributions are therefore subject to the limits on contributions to candidates. 52 U. S. C. §30116(a)(8). An FEC regulation defines earmarking as any “designation, instruction, or encumbrance” that directs funds to support a candidate. 11 CFR §110.6(b)(1) (2025).

19In McCutcheon, the Court explained that earmarking rules are a focused and constitutionally allowed way for the Government to prevent evasion of the base limits on contributions to candidates. It is hard to imagine a realistic situation in which a donor could use earmarking to evade those base limits without also violating the earmarking regulations.

19As to disclosure laws, FECA requires political parties and candidates to publicly report both the contributions they receive and their campaign spending, including coordinated expenditures. §30104(b). McCutcheon stressed that disclosure has become a much stronger tool against evasion because “modern technology” is a “particularly effective means of arming the voting public with information.” “Today, given the Internet,

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194 Also, federal criminal bribery laws directly prohibit quid pro quo exchanges in which contributions are traded for official action. For example, 18 U. S. C. §201.

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20disclosure provides much stronger protection against corruption than it once did. Because enormous amounts of information can be reached with one mouse click, disclosure is effective in a way that was not possible when the Court decided earlier cases, including Colorado II. McCutcheon’s point is even more accurate today than it was in 2014 because technology has continued to advance.

20That transparency matters both in practice and in law. In practice, the Court has explained that disclosure can discourage actual corruption and prevent its appearance by making large contributions and expenditures public. Disclosure can also help trigger investigations into whether a donor and party violated earmarking laws. Legally, McCutcheon stressed that disclosure is often a less restrictive option than complete bans on certain types or amounts of speech.

20Amicus and intervenors respond that earmarking and disclosure rules are useful but not enough to prevent evasion of the base contribution limits. But because important First Amendment rights are at stake, those arguments are ultimately not persuasive.

20Regarding earmarking rules, amicus and intervenors argue that the rules leave a gap when a donor merely expects a donation to support a particular candidate but does not actively direct the money. But under the Court’s current precedents, an expectation or hope alone is not circumvention or quid pro quo corruption, or its appearance, especially because the donor lacks control of the funds after giving them to the party. The possibility that a political party might follow a contributor’s expectations or hopes, or is even likely to do so, is not

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21enough to overcome the First Amendment and justify restricting political-party speech.

21The court-appointed amicus and the intervenors also argue that the earmarking rules often have no real force because “violations are essentially impossible to discover and prove.” But there is no good reason to think the Government cannot detect a donor who tries to disguise a large contribution to a particular candidate by routing it through a party. Especially because of the related disclosure requirements, the Government will be able to identify those contributions easily enough and, when justified, investigate them as possible earmarks.

21Also, if the amicus and intervenors mean that earmarking rules are not enforced enough, that is mainly a problem involving the Executive Branch’s investigative resources and enforcement priorities. But an alleged lack of Executive enforcement of campaign-finance restrictions does not justify Congress and the Executive enacting laws that broadly suppress speech and disregard the First Amendment. As JUSTICE THOMAS explained, “Vigilant enforcement” of the earmarking rules is a more “precise response” to any “circumvention concerns.”

21For those reasons, McCutcheon relied on the earmarking rule when explaining why the aggregate contribution limits in that case were unnecessary to prevent circumvention. The same reasoning applies here. The amicus and intervenors question whether disclosure rules can adequately replace limits on coordinated spending by political parties. But as McCutcheon explained, modern technology

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22has developed so that “disclosure now offers a particularly effective means of arming the voting public with information.”

22Importantly, disclosure does not work alone. The base contribution limits, earmarking rules, and disclosure requirements work together to serve the Government’s interest in preventing circumvention, without placing an excessive restriction on core political-party speech.

22The amicus and intervenors argue that the base limits on candidate contributions, earmarking rules, and disclosure requirements still do not adequately prevent circumvention. But the current record from the States does not show enough risk that coordinated political-party spending will cause quid pro quo corruption, meaning exchanges of money for official action. In campaign-finance cases, the Court has often considered the States’ experience. When States do not impose a particular campaign-finance restriction and there is no evidence of resulting quid pro quo corruption, that strongly suggests the concern is too speculative to support the same restriction at the federal level. As Chief Judge Sutton explained in the Sixth Circuit, most States “largely give parties free rein to make coordinated expenditures on behalf of their state-level nominees.” Yet “no evidence of corruption” through circumvention “has materialized.”

22That record from the States weakens the claim that federal limits on coordinated political-party spending are proportionate, necessary, and narrowly tailored to address circumvention. When speech restrictions are at issue, a lack of evidence matters. Speculation is not enough to justify suppressing political speech. The Court has “never accepted mere conjecture as adequate to carry a

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23First Amendment burden.”

23The base limits on contributions to candidates provide a first preventive measure against quid pro quo corruption, or its appearance, because most contributions to candidates are not exchanged for official action. The earmarking rules provide a second preventive measure, and the disclosure requirements provide a third. Thus, three layers of prevention already protect against quid pro quo corruption or its appearance.

23The political-party coordinated-expenditure limits at issue would create a fourth line of defense. When the Government adds preventive measure upon preventive measure, the Court must examine especially carefully whether the law properly fits its goal. But this fourth measure directly and severely restricts free speech and infringes fundamental First Amendment values. Put differently, the restriction on coordinated political-party spending is “disproportionate” and is not “necessary” and “narrowly tailored” to the Government’s interest in preventing circumvention of the base contribution limits.

23It is useful to focus briefly on McCutcheon’s term “disproportionate.” In campaign finance, deciding how much regulation is enough to serve the Government’s stated interest is not scientific. But because First Amendment speech rights are involved, courts must be especially watchful. Courts cannot approve one more regulation simply by asking what harm it could do when that regulation would restrict speech. Instead, courts must preserve and protect the freedom of speech guaranteed by the Framers. “Necessary,” “narrowly tailored,” and “disproportionate” may be technical legal terms, but they

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24help courts properly respect the basic First Amendment principles involved.

24In summary, the Government has other meaningful preventive measures available, while limiting a political party’s spending to support its candidates severely infringes political speech protected by the First Amendment. The Court therefore concludes that the political-party coordinated-expenditure limits are “disproportionate” and are not “necessary” or “narrowly tailored” to protect the Government’s interest in preventing circumvention.

24IV. Despite all the points above, the amicus and intervenors argue that the Court should follow Colorado II under stare decisis, the principle of generally following precedent.

24But Colorado II is like a three-legged stool whose three legs have all been knocked out by decisions issued after Colorado II. In similar situations, the Court has sometimes simply described precedents that were hollowed out in the same way

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245 In 2014, Congress changed the political-party coordinated-expenditure limits to exclude certain kinds of political-party spending. Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015, 128 Stat. 2772–2773. The law now places no limit on how much a political party may spend in coordination with candidates on election recounts, contests after election day, and other election-related legal proceedings. 52 U. S. C. §§30116(a)(9), (d)(5). The law also raised to $20 million the limit on how much a party may spend in coordination with its candidates on a Presidential nominating convention.

24We need not and do not rely on those statutory changes to decide this case today. But those exceptions further show that Congress is not pursuing an anti-corruption or anti-circumvention rationale with the current limits on coordinated spending by political parties. It is difficult to see why corruption concerns would justify limiting spending on candidate advertising while allowing spending on a candidate’s legal fees. From a candidate’s perspective, coordinated spending on messages is not meaningfully different from coordinated spending on lawyers.

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25The Court has treated precedents as so weakened by later developments that they are no longer good law and have no remaining force. See Agostini; Herrera; Kennedy. The Court has not hesitated to stop following an outdated doctrine or isolated legal rule. See Kimble. That description fits Colorado II. Even so, we will apply the usual stare decisis factors, which govern whether the Court should follow precedent.

25The Court has often said that stare decisis, the practice of following precedent, promotes fair, predictable, and consistent legal rules, supports reliance on court decisions, and strengthens the real and perceived integrity of the judicial process. See Payne. But stare decisis is not an absolute command and is weakest when the Court interprets the Constitution. See Ramos. As Justice Brandeis wrote, and as remains true, the Court has often overruled constitutional decisions because correction through legislative action is practically impossible. See Burnet (Brandeis, J., dissenting).

25In reviewing precedent under stare decisis, the Court has sometimes asked broadly whether there is a “special justification” to overrule it. See Ramos (KAVANAUGH, J., concurring in part). To decide whether to overrule a constitutional precedent, the Court considers how serious the precedent’s error was, its effects on law and the real world, and any legally recognized reliance interests. See Ramos (opinion

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26of the Court); see also Justice KAVANAUGH’s opinion. A prior ruling may have been “egregiously wrong when decided,” or later legal or factual understandings or developments may reveal that it was egregiously wrong. See Ramos.

26Begin with how serious the claimed error was. In Colorado II, JUSTICE THOMAS dissented, joined by Chief Justice Rehnquist, Justice Scalia, and Justice Kennedy. He explained that political parties ordinarily support candidates through coordinated spending. He added that parties and candidates share interests, naturally work together, and that breaking their connection inhibits promotion of the party’s message. He also noted that the Court had never upheld a spending limit against political parties. Most importantly, he said the Government had more narrowly designed options, including earmarking rules that prohibit donations to parties when the money is designated to support specific candidates. Instead of broadly restricting party speech, he said, the Government should have used those narrower options to fight the claimed corruption. JUSTICE THOMAS’s Colorado II dissent was persuasive in 2001 and has been strongly confirmed by this Court’s later precedents. Some developments after 2001 follow:

26The Court no longer uses Colorado II’s weaker review, which allowed “unskillful tailoring” in First Amendment campaign-finance cases. The Court now applies stricter review: A statutory restriction cannot be “disproportionate” and

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27must be “necessary” and “narrowly tailored” to the claimed interest. See McCutcheon; Ted Cruz for Senate. The Court has also rejected the undue-influence rationale used in Colorado II. See McCutcheon. After Colorado II, the Court identified earmarking and disclosure laws as enough to prevent circumvention. Colorado II’s description of the relationship between parties and candidates has also not survived. Colorado II said parties are not “in a unique position” regarding candidates. But the Court later recognized that only parties select slates of candidates and that voters primarily identify candidates by party affiliation. See McConnell. Political parties therefore occupy a unique position and share “a special relationship and unity of interest” with candidates. As for Colorado II’s effects, that decision partly relied on concern that parties could have excessive influence in campaigns and elections, especially by acting as agents for those who spend money to produce obligated officeholders. Colorado II said parties’ power to focus resources on electing candidates also seemed to make them open to use as channels for evading contribution and coordinated-spending limits that apply to other political participants.

27But since 2001, political parties’ relative power has substantially diminished compared with outside groups. Colorado II partly contributed to that change because the limits on coordinated spending by political parties have a “stifling

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28effect on the ability of the party to do what it exists to do.” See Colorado I (Kennedy, J.); Pildes. Meanwhile, donors can and do give money to Super PACs and other outside groups. Under the First Amendment, those groups may receive and spend unlimited amounts to support their independent political speech. See SpeechNow.org; Emily’s List. During the 2024 election cycle, PACs raised over $15.7 billion, while political parties raised $2.7 billion. See Federal Election Comm’n, Statistical Summary of 24-Month Campaign Activity of the 2023–2024 Election Cycle Press Release (Apr. 23, 2025).

28Upholding the coordinated-spending limits could therefore keep political parties in a weaker, second-tier position compared with outside groups. Weak political parties distort the political system. Many people believe the parties’ relative decline has increased political division and fragmentation. For that reason, many people who generally support campaign-finance restrictions have called for ending the limits on coordinated spending by political parties. See Pildes & Bauer, Election Law Blog: The Supreme Court, the Political Parties, and the SuperPacs (June 24, 2025).

28Finally, consider reliance interests. Outside groups have relied on a precedent that helped them gain an unjustified and unfair advantage over competing political parties. But that is not the kind of reliance interest that

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29requires the Court to keep following an egregiously wrong precedent. More speech is generally better than less speech.

29In short, later cases have rejected Colorado II’s reasoning, and the Court’s more recent precedents show that it is no longer good law. To the extent Colorado II still had any legal force, the Court now overrules it.

29V. We make two main points in response to the thoughtful dissent. First, disputes about the First Amendment and campaign finance have often arisen during the last 50 years. We recognize that at least two dissenters have disagreed with some Court decisions in this area. See Ted Cruz for Senate (KAGAN, J., dissenting); McCutcheon (Breyer, J., dissenting); Citizens United (Stevens, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part). Today, we have tried to follow the principles established by the Court’s decisions. We have also concluded that, in our view, Colorado II is an outlier inconsistent with those precedents.

29The dissent focuses especially on how joint fundraising committees operate. Its apparent concern is that a donor could write a large check to a joint committee, which could then funnel the money to the candidate. See KAGAN, J., dissenting, at 7–12, 15–18. But McCutcheon rejected a similar argument about evading contribution limits, and its

29——————

296 To be clear, the Court’s decision does not consider the statutory limits on coordinated expenditures by outside groups. As the Government explained at oral argument, political parties have an especially strong First Amendment interest in working with their candidates and coordinating spending on political speech with them. See Tr. of Oral Arg. 65–66.

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30The same reasoning applies here. In McCutcheon, the Court explained that a joint fundraising committee is only a way for individual committees to raise money together, not a way to evade base contribution limits or rules against earmarking money for a particular candidate. Any agreement between a donor and a committee to direct money to a particular candidate would activate the earmarking rule. Thus, this method of evasion could work only by assuming that the joint committee would transparently violate the earmarking rules and would not be caught. McCutcheon, 572 U. S., at 215.

30Second, although the dissent is concerned about money in political campaigns and the Court’s First Amendment cases, its core legal disagreement with the Court is narrow, though important in practice. Justice Kagan’s dissent says the only difference is whether the Government’s strong interest in preventing evasion of the base limits also justifies the coordinated-expenditure caps at issue here, while recognizing that this is not a small issue. See post, at 5 (opinion of Kagan, J.).

30The Court and the dissent agree that the Government has an important interest in preventing circumvention of the base contribution limits. As explained above, the Court concludes that the statutory base limits, earmarking rules, and disclosure requirements together are enough to prevent circumvention. The dissent believes the coordinated-expenditure limits are also necessary. The Court considers that a serious argument but respectfully disagrees for the reasons already explained at length in this opinion.

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31* * * The intervenors declare that the Framers were well known for distrusting political parties. But the Framers were even better known for distrusting government suppression of political speech. See Brief for Intervenor-Respondents 28.

31Remember the First Amendment’s words: “Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech.” The Constitution’s text matters. Contrary to that text, the limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures directly restrict the parties’ freedom of speech.

31History matters too. For nearly 200 years after the First Amendment was ratified, parties could coordinate campaign spending with candidates. Parties and candidates could work together toward their shared goals of promoting policies and winning elections to carry out those policies. Again, no one claims that those elections failed to function or were marred by corruption, as Justice Thomas’s Colorado II dissent observed. 533 U. S. 431, 473 (2001).

31Precedent also matters. The Court’s more recent decisions in McCutcheon and Cruz, unlike Colorado II, show that the First Amendment forbids disproportionate regulations such as FECA’s limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures. See McCutcheon, 572 U. S. 185, 218 (2014); Cruz, 596 U. S. 289, 306–307 (2022).

31In summary, the Constitution’s text, history, and precedent establish that the limits on political parties’ coordinated expenditures violate the First Amendment.

31Importantly, by holding that FECA’s restrictions on political parties’ coordinated expenditures are unconstitutional, the

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32Court’s decision today treats every political party equally. It will allow all political parties, including the DNC, RNC, their respective Senate and House campaign committees, and other parties and party committees, to participate more freely, compete more fully in politics, and coordinate more closely with their candidates. Going forward, the Democratic party, Republican party, and all other parties and candidates may compete equally under the same coordinated-expenditure rules. Within the law, they may organize their fundraising, spending, and political speech as they choose on equal terms.

32The Court reverses the judgment of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit and sends the case back for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

32The Court orders this result.

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33_________________

33No. 24–621

33_________________

33NATIONAL REPUBLICAN SENATORIAL COMMITTEE,

33ET AL., PETITIONERS v. FEDERAL ELECTION

33COMMISSION, ET AL.

33ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF

33APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

33[June 30, 2026]

33JUSTICE KAGAN dissents, joined by JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR and JUSTICE JACKSON.

33For over half a century, a federal law has guarded against actual and apparent quid pro quo corruption in our political system by limiting how much money a donor may give a candidate. The idea is simple: A candidate may be induced to exchange official acts for campaign contributions, and a larger contribution increases both that temptation and the public’s suspicion.

33The same statute also prevents circumvention of the contribution limits by limiting political parties’ “coordinated expenditures” with candidates. A coordinated expenditure essentially lets a party pay bills that the candidate otherwise would have to pay. Without limits, a candidate could ask a donor to make a substantial contribution to the party to cover the candidate’s campaign costs. The donor could give much more to the party than directly to the candidate, knowing the money would be passed through to the candidate. That would effectively erase the candidate contribution limits, and all the old opportunities for quid pro quo deals would come back into

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34play. Congress therefore reasonably limited parties’ coordinated expenditures. By preventing circumvention of the basic contribution limits, Congress preserved those limits’ ability to suppress corruption.

34But today the Court changes the rules to allow people to get around contribution limits. By striking down Congress’s limit on coordinated expenditures, the majority lets a party act like another checking account for a campaign. A donor may now give a party as much as half a million dollars, compared with the $7,000 the donor may give the candidate directly, to pay the candidate’s bills. The candidate may ask for that donation. The Court thus restores the same opportunities for quid pro quo corruption that contribution limits were designed to prevent.

34Contrary to the majority, the First Amendment does not require this result, as the Court has held before. It allows campaign-finance rules that are narrowly tailored to prevent quid pro quo corruption and its appearance. Limits on parties’ coordinated expenditures easily meet that test because they prevent simple evasion of contribution limits. Both kinds of limits are needed to prevent corrupt deals between candidates and supporters. This was the Court’s rule, not merely my own view. Twenty-five years ago, in Colorado II, the Court considered and rejected the same arguments the majority accepts today. The majority must overrule Colorado II to reach this result, again disregarding the central legal principle of stare decisis, which generally requires respect for precedent. More importantly for the American political system, the majority again discards a rule needed to protect the integrity of democracy. With respect, I dissent.

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35I A. Soon after the 1972 presidential elections, Congress moved to strengthen the Federal Election Campaign Act because of recent disclosures of quid pro quo corruption. One major example involved an apparent exchange of campaign contributions for milk price supports worth many millions of dollars to the dairy industry. See Final Report of the Select Committee on Presidential Campaign Activities, S. Rep. No. 93– 981, pp. 623, 680 (1974). After long consideration, the Nixon administration had first decided not to raise the subsidies. See id., at 622, 633. But after meeting with industry leaders, the President changed his mind. He told senior aides to tell the dairymen that they needed to reaffirm their $2 million campaign pledge “as a condition for the public announcement of [a milk subsidy] increase.” Id., at 648, 682; see also id., at 642–643, describing the milk producers’ later “middle-of-the-night rendezvous” to arrange immediate “commitments of substantial financial contributions.” “The dairymen agreed, the announcement was made,” and “the promised contributions began to flow.” Id., at 682. A few years later, Congress amended campaign-finance laws mainly to prevent this kind of “quid pro quo corruption and its appearance.” McCutcheon. Its goal was to stop the “opportunities for abuse” linked to large campaign donations. Buckley. Central to the 1974 reforms were “base limits,” which cap how much any donor may give a candidate’s campaign. The reason is clear: Campaigns are expensive, candidates need contributions, and the

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36bigger, the better. To obtain large contributions, candidates may be willing to offer public-policy favors, such as a government decision or vote. Even if that does not happen, the public can see the incentives and opportunities to buy and sell policy results. Congress therefore set strict base limits to protect both the “integrity of” and public “confidence in” our “system of representative Government.” Buckley. In 1974, the limit was $1,000 per election. Today, it is $3,500, or $7,000 when the primary and general elections are counted together. See FEC, Contribution Limits for 2025–2026 (Jan. 30, 2025) (https://perma.cc/ 57Q5-PYKG). The Court has long recognized that these limits comply with the First Amendment. Preventing quid pro quo corruption and its appearance is an important, indeed “compelling,” government interest. McCutcheon; Buckley. The limits are also “closely drawn” to advance that interest. Buckley. They target large campaign contributions while leaving supporters free to take part in other political activities, including making small donations. They therefore focus on the part of political life most capable of creating actual or potential corruption.

36The Court has also recognized that further rules may be allowed to prevent easy evasion of the base limits. See McCutcheon; McConnell; Buckley. The reason is straightforward. If a donor can route money around the base limits, those limits will become ineffective at preventing actual and apparent quid pro quo corruption. So, to the extent that a campaign-finance law is properly “tailored to the Government’s interest in preventing circumvention

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37of the base limits,” it satisfies constitutional review. McCutcheon. Today’s majority agrees. See ante, at 27. For example, it says “earmarking rules,” discussed later, are a “constitutionally permissible way for the Government to prohibit circumvention of the base limits on contributions to candidates.” Ante, at 16, citing McCutcheon. The disagreement is whether the Government’s strong interest in stopping evasion of the base limits also justifies the coordinated-expenditure caps at issue here.

37B. The anti-circumvention principle should establish that the caps are constitutional. A $7,000 contribution limit is useless if a donor can use a political party to send the candidate hundreds of thousands more. Congress used limits on parties’ coordinated expenditures to prevent that evasion, and those limits are well tailored to the law’s purpose. That is all the First Amendment requires. For that reason, this Court upheld the same restriction against the same challenge 25 years ago in Colorado II.

37First consider the different forms a coordinated expenditure may take. The majority gives one example that is least damaging to its position, but that example is not typical. A party, it

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371 Contrary to how the majority describes the issue, see ante, at 14–15, the question here, which the Court has answered before, is not whether caps on a party’s coordinated expenditures may prevent evasion of base limits through party contributions “earmarked (i.e., directed) to a candidate.” The question is whether the caps may prevent evasion of the base limits by any method. The constitutional inquiry focuses on evasion of the base limits, no matter how it happens. As discussed later, without the caps, donors may use parties to evade base limits without earmarking at all. See infra, at 15–17.

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38The majority says a party might want to pay for and air a television ad supporting a candidate after consulting the candidate’s campaign about the ad’s content, timing, or placement. Ante, at 7. Such an ad may closely resemble a party’s independent speech supporting a candidate, which cannot be limited. See ante, at 6–7. That is why the majority leads with this example. But what happened here is more typical: The candidate’s campaign created an ad by itself and later sent the bill to the party. The party replied, “Received. Will process,” showing that it acted more like a simple piggy bank than a partner in creating speech. 1 App. 202–203; 2 id., at 481. A third kind of party-coordinated spending involves no ad or other speech. For example, a candidate might send the party a pollster’s bill, campaign-office rent or electricity bill, or catering bill for an event. The party is then simply helping pay the candidate’s financial obligations. That is why Colorado II recognized that coordinated party expenditures, like those by individuals or non-party groups, can be “virtually indistinguishable” from direct contributions to a candidate. 533 U. S., at 444–445; see id., at 467 (THOMAS, J., dissenting) (acknowledging that point).

38Because coordinated expenditures are “as useful to the candidate as cash,” Congress has long recognized that they would undermine contribution limits if left unregulated. Id., at 446 (majority opinion). Start with donors who are individuals or non-party groups, including corporations and interest groups. The $7,000 base limit would have no purpose if a wealthy donor could spend hundreds of thousands more to pay campaign expenses. Campaign-finance law therefore treats those donors’ coordinated expenditures as contributions subject to the usual base limits. See 52 U. S. C. §30116(a)(7)(B).

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39This Court upheld that rule long ago, explaining that it prevents efforts to evade the Act through planned or coordinated spending that amounts to a disguised contribution. Buckley, 424 U. S., at 47. The majority does not disturb that holding today, see ante, at 26, n. 6, though someone following the Court’s recent campaign-finance decisions might reasonably be cautious. The rule for party-coordinated expenditures is somewhat different because the problem is different. The majority is right that cooperation between a party and its candidates is generally proper. See ante, at 11. A problem arises only when the party acts as a channel through which individuals and non-party groups finance candidates. Then party-mediated payments may create the same corruption concerns as the donors’ own payments. Congress therefore allowed parties some, but strictly limited, coordinated spending with their candidates. As the majority explains, the limits range from $65,300 for most House candidates to around $32 million for a presidential candidate. See ante, at 3; §30116(d). Congress believed that allowing more, especially allowing no limits, would create too much risk of quid pro quo deals between donors and candidates.

39To understand why Congress was right, one must examine modern fundraising, which the majority does not do. Imagine a presidential candidate named John Smith who wants to raise as much money as possible. Remember that under the

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392 Although this example uses a presidential candidate, the same method applies to House and Senate candidates. Candidates for lower office can and do use this fundraising tool. See Brief for Campaign Legal Center et al. as Amici Curiae 28–29. As a practical matter, campaigns for lower offices involve smaller dollar amounts than presidential campaigns. But because each dollar goes further in a lower-office campaign, a donor can also secure a quid pro

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40current base limits, one individual donor may give Smith’s campaign no more than $7,000 for the primary and general elections. See supra, at 4. But Smith may get much more from that donor by raising money together with his party’s national and state committees. He can form a “joint fundraising committee,” perhaps called the John Smith Victory Fund, made up of his campaign committee, the national party committee, either the RNC or DNC, and party committees from each of the 50 States, or nearly all of them. Under the party base limits, a national committee may accept $44,300 from one individual donor, and a state committee may accept $10,000. See FEC, Contribution Limits for 2025–2026. A joint fundraising committee can collect money for all 52 member committees through one payment. The donor writes one check to the John Smith Victory Fund for the total allowed contribution to all committees. Fifty contributions of $10,000, the state committee limit, total $500,000. Adding the allowed contributions for the national committee ($44,300) and Smith’s campaign committee ($7,000) lets one individual donor give the John Smith Victory Fund over $550,000, or $551,300, to be precise.

40Most of that money is usually pooled in the national party committee’s account soon afterward. This happens in two steps. First, the John Smith Victory Fund divides the money among its member committees according to the contribution limits. The national party receives $44,300, and each state party receives $10,000. But most state parties then quickly transfer their $10,000 to the national party, sometimes on the same

40------ quo with less money. Thus, generally speaking, the risk of corruption is the same.

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41day. See §30116(a)(4), which allows unlimited transfers between a political party’s state and national committees. As a result, most of a large donor’s $550,000 check to the John Smith Victory Fund soon reaches the national party committee. The key question then is what the party may do with that money.

41Before today, the party could use the money for many purposes, but could use very little of it to pay John Smith’s campaign bills. Campaign-finance law limits a party’s direct contribution to a candidate to $5,000 per election, so direct transfers are not an option. See §30116(a)(2). The limits on coordinated expenditures are also so low compared with a campaign’s total expenses that this spending is minor. See supra, at 7; Brief for Federal Respondents 21, noting, for example, that party-coordinated expenditures in House races have never exceeded 1% of total campaign spending. Thus, before today’s decision, the overwhelming majority of contributions collected by the John Smith Victory Fund would go toward party spending that benefits the candidate only incidentally, even if meaningfully. For example, the party might improve get-out-the-vote efforts, pay administrative costs, or support down

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413 See, for example, Levine, Soft Money Is Back, reporting that state Republican parties transferred nearly every dollar received from the Trump Victory Committee to the RNC; K. Vogel & I. Arnsdorf, Clinton Fundraising Leaves Little for State Parties, Politico, May 2, 2016, reporting that the vast majority of the millions the Hillary Victory Fund gave state parties was quickly transferred to the DNC, usually within a day or two; K. Evers-Hillstrom, Trump Raised Record Money for State Parties, Then His RNC Took It Back, OpenSecrets, Feb. 24, 2021, reporting that on Oct. 15, the Alaska Republican Party received nearly $2.7 million from Trump Victory and transferred the exact same amount to the RNC that day; ibid., reporting that the Nebraska Democratic Party transferred $4.3 million to the DNC on Oct. 22, one day after receiving the exact same total from the Biden Victory Fund; ibid., reporting that dozens of state parties in strongly Republican or Democratic states used the exact same strategy.

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42ballot candidates. The party might instead spend the money on ads it produces independently. But the money is not helpful for funding John Smith’s own campaign activities of any kind.

42Today, that restriction disappears. Without limits on coordinated expenditures, the party can act as the candidate’s checking account. It can pay for everything John Smith, or any other candidate, needs, including ads, catering, rent, and utilities. See supra, at 5–6. The party can take any or all of the $550,000 checks received from the John Smith Victory Fund, which got them from individuals or corporate or interest groups, and turn the full amount into a direct benefit for the candidate. Money that is supposed to be the sum of capped donations to 51 separate party committees instead goes directly to John Smith. This can happen repeatedly.

42It is easy to see how this arrangement gets around the candidate contribution limit and increases the risk of actual or apparent quid pro quo corruption. Formally, every base limit is followed: $7,000 to the candidate, $10,000 to each state party committee, and $44,300 to the national committee. But in practice, the candidate can get all the money for his own campaign. A supposedly limited $7,000 contribution therefore becomes a $550,000 contribution, or $551,300 to be precise, to John Smith. Everyone knows this. The candidate understands what the $550,000 will do for him and where it originally came from. The donor also understands the main facts. His small $7,000 contribution was unlikely to obtain anything important from the candidate, but $550,000 is very different. Even if John Smith and all his wealthy donors act completely properly, the

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43The public can see that the system creates many opportunities and incentives for political corruption. Apparent quid pro quo exchanges, meaning money given in return for political action, will seem to be everywhere. In short, when a political party becomes the channel for oversized donations to a candidate, the base limits no longer effectively restrain actual or apparent corruption.

43This is not a new insight. Calling it merely old would understate how obvious it is. Some 25 years ago, in Colorado II, the Court rejected the same First Amendment challenge presented here and upheld limits on a party’s coordinated expenditures. The Court gave exactly the reasons stated above: “unlimited coordinated spending by a party raises the risk of corruption (and its appearance) through circumvention of valid contribution limits.” The Court recognized that parties play a major political role and reaffirmed that their independent expenditures could not constitutionally be limited. But it sharply distinguished independent expenditures from coordinated expenditures because coordinated spending is valuable to the candidate’s campaign. The Court explained that “[a] party’s coordinated expenditure” was functionally the same as “a direct party contribution to the candidate.” Therefore, allowing unlimited coordinated party spending would attract more contributions to parties from donors seeking to pass money to potential officeholders. The predictable result would weaken base contribution limits and increase the danger that donors and candidates would make “quid pro quo agreements.”

43The only real-world change since then is that the danger has grown because this Court has ensured that the amounts involved are larger. For years, campaign finance law set “aggregate limits” on how much a donor could give to federal

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44candidates and party committees during a two-year election cycle. In 2013-2014, for example, the limit was $123,200, far below the $551,300 payment described above. But in McCutcheon, the Court invalidated that aggregate limit. Because of that change, one donor working through a joint fundraising committee can now route as much as $551,300 to one candidate. Candidates from both parties have therefore tried to make their joint committees as large as possible, a development that the McCutcheon majority dismissed and the McCutcheon dissent predicted. With this structure, a donor can now funnel to a candidate about 80 times what the base limits say should be the maximum. Thus, limits on a party’s coordinated expenditures are needed more than ever to prevent quid pro quo corruption.

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444 The McCutcheon majority called it “divorced from reality” and “foreclose[d]” by “experience and common sense” that “a donor giv[ing] a $500,000 check to a joint fundraising committee composed of a candidate, a national party committee, and most of the party’s state party committees.” But candidate Kamala Harris had such a committee, the Harris Victory Fund, made up of her campaign, the DNC, and 50 state party committees. Candidate Donald Trump’s committee, the Trump 47 Committee, Inc., included his campaign, the RNC, and 48 state party committees. It lacked Hawaii and Vermont. The FEC’s online database, www.fec.gov/data, shows that both committees received checks from multiple donors who gave the maximum party contributions. After a pair of transfers, those funds ended up at the DNC or RNC. See FEC, Contributions to Harris Victory Fund (https://perma.cc/K8GB-WWGY); FEC, Disbursements of Harris Victory Fund (https://perma.cc/H3V4-DJVQ); FEC, Receipts of DNC (https://perma.cc/T93L-WVA7); FEC, Contributions to Trump 47 Committee, Inc. (https://perma.cc/R9CE-43QU); FEC, Disbursements of Trump 47 Committee, Inc. (https://perma.cc/2SSA-6XA4); FEC, Receipts of RNC (https://perma.cc/49P8-9BSN).

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45II. To overrule a precedent like Colorado II, the Court once required a “special justification” beyond simply believing the earlier decision was wrong. Stare decisis, the principle of following precedent, supports the fair, predictable, and consistent development of legal rules, encourages reliance on judicial decisions, and strengthens the actual and perceived integrity of the judicial process. It also promotes judicial humility, which is too often lacking. Yet the majority largely dismisses the requirement of a “special justification.” It prefers to explain why it believes settled law is wrong instead of showing the unusual need to begin again.

45Today’s supposed stare decisis analysis mainly explains why the present majority would have decided Colorado II differently if it had been the majority in 2001. The analysis prominently relies on JUSTICE THOMAS’s dissent in that case, as though the rest of today’s majority only needed to have been there to join him. Today’s ruling therefore joins recent decisions overruling established law because a new majority has a new view of an important issue. Here, that issue is campaign finance law. Citizens United overruled Austin and part of McConnell; McCutcheon overruled part of Buckley; Ted Cruz for Senate (invalidating 52 U. S. C. §30116(j)); and Davis (invalidating §30117). For those who believe this country has too much campaign finance law, and who would prefer even more money to be pumped even more

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46easily into politics despite the danger of corruption, this overruling is for you.

46The majority eventually gives three changed circumstances, two legal and one factual, to support its holding, but none succeeds. First, it says Colorado II used a more deferential standard of review than the Court uses now. That is incorrect. Colorado II used the standard recognized as appropriate for the last 50 years, asking whether the restriction was “closely drawn” to match the “sufficiently important” government interest in fighting political corruption. Even today’s majority ultimately uses that standard, calling the difference from another supposed test “subtle” and ultimately “academic.” Second, the majority criticizes Colorado II for treating “undue influence” as political corruption. Colorado II did mention that idea in a parenthetical in its background section, but it did not matter to the holding. The holding rested explicitly and only on the risk that coordinated party expenditures create a “danger” of money being “given as a quid pro quo for improper commitments.”

46Third is the claimed factual change. The majority complains that political parties’ relative power has substantially diminished compared with “Super PACs and other outside groups,” which can “receive and spend unlimited money” on campaigns. It says Colorado II partly caused that shift. But that argument is striking. If decisions are to be overruled or reversed on that ground, more obvious targets are the decisions that created the modern Super PAC system: Citizens United and SpeechNow.org v.

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47Federal Election Comm’n. In any event, the majority’s new theory of balance, which overrules Colorado II to restore political parties to their proper role in American politics, is improvised rather than well supported. I suspect that in a decade or two it will be easy to disprove the majority’s claim that Colorado II has prevented a fully functioning party system.

47There is no need to dwell on the majority’s failures concerning stare decisis because today’s decision is wrong even if the Court properly starts from scratch. The majority must explain how to prevent people from getting around the base contribution limits without limits on coordinated party expenditures. It delays that task by working through no less than three strawman arguments, meaning arguments that no one actually makes or defends. The reason for the delay is clear: When the majority reaches the key question, it has no satisfactory answer. It relies entirely on two alternative “prophylactic measures,” meaning preventive safeguards: earmarking rules and disclosure requirements. But those two measures are not enough by themselves. Without caps too, they can be considered sufficient only through willful blindness or wishful thinking.

47Consider first what earmarking rules cover and what they do not. As the majority explains, if a donor earmarks or otherwise directs a party contribution to a candidate, the law treats it as a contribution to that candidate. Thus, if a donor tells a party, “I want you to send this on to John Smith,” the money counts as a contribution to John Smith and is subject to the $7,000 base limit for candidate donations. (The donor therefore can earmark only up to $7,000.) But suppose the donor gives no such instruction and just sends a $550,000 check

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48to the John Smith Victory Fund described above. Campaign finance law permits that payment because none of it counts as earmarked. Thus, earmarking rules do not affect the mechanism described above: The $550,00 goes to the Victory Fund, is distributed to state party committees, is pooled in the national party committee, and is then used to pay the candidate’s bills. Despite those rules and the $7,000 base limit, a donor can therefore pay $550,000 to support the candidate’s campaign, creating all the opportunities for political corruption that such oversized donations raise.

48Perhaps the majority thinks, though I am guessing because it avoids the details of campaign finance, that the example above cannot involve a quid pro quo because the $550,000 payment to the Victory Fund includes no instructions to use the money for the candidate. If so, that is wrong. Suppose John Smith tells a donor, “If you give money to my Victory Fund, I will subsidize your latest venture,” or, if Smith were a Congressman, “I will vote to subsidize the venture.” The donor then gives the money without any earmark. That is plainly a quid pro quo: The donor makes a requested payment to the candidate’s joint fundraising committee in exchange for an official act. The donor need not use words earmarking the money. He need not even understand how the campaign finance system will eventually make the money available for Smith’s own use. And if the majority then argues that a

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485 That is why, as I said earlier, donors would not need to earmark money to use parties to get around the base limits if the caps did not exist. See supra, at 5, n. 1. It is also why the majority is wrong to ask only whether the caps on a party’s coordinated expenditures prevent circumvention through earmarking. The proper question includes circumvention by any method, including methods without earmarking. See ibid.

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49candidate would not consider the quid pro quo worthwhile because he could not be 100% certain that 100% of the money would come back to him, cf. ante, at 13–14, 17, that argument would also be wrong. Parties have strong reasons to make sure a candidate can directly use most of the money he raises for his joint committee. One reason is that the party wants to elect the skilled fundraiser-candidate who obtained the money. The party may keep some of it. But ordinarily, it would keep nowhere near enough to reduce a $550,000 donation to anything close to the $7,000 base limit. Earmarking rules therefore will not prevent circumvention of the base limits or the resulting risk of corruption.

49A point I made earlier also applies here: This is not a new insight, even though campaign finance methods keep changing. See supra, at 11. Colorado II made basically the same point about the limits of earmarking rules, even before joint fundraising committees became so

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496 The majority’s only response is that McCutcheon, when deciding aggregate limits, “rejected a similar circumvention argument,” ante, at 26. But that greatly overstates McCutcheon. The case did not hold, as the majority suggests, that joint fundraising committees are generally impervious to attempts to evade contribution limits. It addressed only one hypothetical from the District Court involving a scheme with “illegal earmarking.” 572 U. S., at 215. In that example, the donor both wrote a check to the joint committee and instructed the party committees that first received the money to redirect it to the candidate. See ibid. McCutcheon said party committees were unlikely to accept those instructions because doing so would be a “transparent violation” of the earmarking regulations. 572 U. S., at 215. Possibly so, although McCutcheon is not otherwise known for accurate predictions. See supra, at 12, and n. 4. But as I have explained, using joint fundraising committees to evade base limits and make quid pro quo deals requires no such violation. See supra, at 16. McCutcheon does not hold that schemes without earmarking fail, by themselves, to present a circumvention problem and therefore a corruption problem.

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50prominent. The Court explained in Colorado II that earmarking rules can “reach only the most clumsy attempts to pass contributions through to candidates.” 533 U. S., at 462. Relying on them therefore ignores the “practical difficulty” of “combating circumvention under actual political conditions.” Ibid. Exactly so. A Court truly committed to preventing that evasion, as Colorado II concluded and as the Colorado II Court was, would not treat “the earmarking provision as the outer limit of acceptable” regulation. Ibid.

50The majority’s second supposed safeguard, disclosure requirements, is even weaker. It praises “modern technology,” which lets people access “massive quantities of information” with a mouse click. Ante, at 16–17. But what does that accomplish? It is good that voters can learn the size of contributions, including large contributions to fundraising committees. But that information does not expose quid pro quo deals and therefore cannot adequately discourage them. That is why Buckley held that disclosure requirements, though “salutary,” could not replace contribution limits. 424 U. S., at 28; see ibid. (“[C]orruption [is] inherent in a system permitting unlimited financial contributions, even when the identities of the contributors and the amounts of their contributions are fully disclosed”). If disclosure cannot replace contribution limits, it also cannot replace the coordinated-expenditure caps that protect those limits from evasion. Depending on disclosure to prevent corruption amounts to abandoning that goal.

50Sadly, that is what the Court does today. A quarter century ago, Colorado II recognized that unrestricted coordinated expenditures by a party were “tailor-made to undermine contribution limits.” 533 U. S., at 464. That is even more true now. See supra, at 11–12. Such expenditures let parties pass oversized contributions to candidates, in amounts massively above the

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51$7,000 base limit. This pass-through system creates a danger of quid pro quo corruption, as though the base limit itself were half a million dollars. Consistent with the First Amendment, Congress may keep the base limit at $7,000. Congress may also cap coordinated payments that could destroy that limit. By ruling otherwise, the majority opens the door to harm of unknown extent.

51When McCutcheon struck down aggregate limits, Justice Breyer wrote in dissent: “[T]oday’s decision eviscerates our Nation’s campaign finance laws, leaving a remnant incapable of dealing with the grave problems of democratic legitimacy that those laws were intended to resolve.” 572 U. S., at 233. I do not know what to call what remains of that remnant, but that is what the Court leaves today. The result will be what Justice Breyer warned about: a legal system that is increasingly unable to stop political corruption and therefore unable to protect the democratic legitimacy of our institutions.