Even if the U.S. Supreme Court only partially strikes down caps on aggregate campaign contributions when it rules in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission, the decision could still open the door to candidates and party officials soliciting individual donors for checks of more than $2.5 million and would increase the likelihood of corruption, Public Citizen concludes in the first of a two-part series on the possible implications of the case.
The report, “Beware of a Naive Perspective: A Prebuttal to Possible U.S. Supreme Court Rulings in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission,” finds that a partial or complete elimination of aggregate contribution limits would enable joint fundraising committees to take on a vastly expanded role because they would be able to receive significantly larger contributions than at present.