Citizens United 2.0 – U.S. Supreme Court to lift aggregate limits to campaign contributions?
Posted by AzBlueMeanie:
On Tuesday, the U.S. Supreme Court granted certiorari in McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission (docket 12-536), a case in which the U.S. Supreme Court could open the door to even more money in politics than it did in its disastrous 2010 decision, Citizens United v FEC. If the court sides with the challengers in McCutcheon v FEC, political power and influence in America will further be concentrated in the hands of wealthy elite plutocrats.
Lyle Denniston at Scotusblog.com provides a brief summary, Campaign donation issue reopened:
Giving itself the option of changing its mind on government power to
limit campaign contributions, the Supreme Court on Tuesday set the stage
for review of the constitutionality of a specific donation ceiling set
by federal law, but a larger issue looms in the background. Since the
Court’s landmark opinion in 1976 in Buckley v. Valeo,
it has always given government more leeway to control contributions to
candidates or political organizations than over spending by candidates
or by independent political activists. That differing
constitutional treatment potentially is at stake in the new case, McCutcheon v. Federal Election Commission (docket 12-536).