McCutcheon vs FEC

McCutcheon v. FEC is a federal lawsuit scheduled to be argued before the U.S. Supreme Court on Oct. 8, 2013. The case is about whether or not Congress may limit the total amount of donations an individual can make, at the federal level, in an election cycle.

What is the limit?

Many people are familiar with limits on how much individuals can give to a campaign; in the 2014 cycle, gifts are capped at $2,600 per candidate per race ($5,200 including both the primary and general election). In addition, they can give up to $5,000 per year to a PAC.

However, there is also an overall limit: No individual can give more than $123,200 in a two-year cycle. Of that amount, only $48,600 can be given to candidates and only $74,600 can be given to PACs. This means that a donor can only give the maximum allowable donation to nine candidates and seven PACs in the 2014 election cycle.

Along with the limits on how much can be given to candidates, committees and parties, the overall cap is increased every election cycle.

First established in the 1970s, the limits on how much an individual can give to a candidate or committee were designed to prevent a handful of individuals from having undue influence over a candidate by being his or her dominant source of funding. However, to make the limits on how much an individual can give to candidates and committees effective, Congress also had to establish an overall cap.

Didn't Citizens United allow unlimited donations?

The U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 decision in Citizens United v. FEC lifted limits on how much money can be given and spent by outside spending groups; many of these are super PACs and politically active nonprofits. Although an outside group may favor a particular candidate, it does not give directly to the candidate and is not allowed to spend the money in coordination with the campaign.

The Supreme Court did not touch the limits on donations to candidates or committees in Citizens United.

Who is McCutcheon?

The plaintiff challenging the limits, Shaun McCutcheon, is an Alabama businessman and member of the Republican National Committee.

What is the court trying to decide in McCutcheon?

The Supreme Court is being asked to decide whether those overall limits are unconstitutional.

In 2012, McCutcheon gave donations to 15 different federal candidates. He has said that he wanted to give more money to even more candidates, but the limits prevented him from doing so. Citing the argument successfully made in the Citizens United decision that political contributions are a type of expression that should fall under the First Amendment's protection, McCutcheon is claiming that the overall cap infringes on his right to freedom of speech.

Opponents are arguing that without the overall limit, any limits are essentially useless. Even if an individual may only give $5,200 to a candidate in an election cycle, if the donor is allowed to give an unlimited amount to other committees -- such as the candidate's leadership PAC, joint fundraising ventures or other organizations affiliated with the candidate -- the money can still flow directly to the candidate, who will be aware of the source of the funds. This would allow wealthy individuals to dominate candidate fundraising and possibly give them undue influence.

How many people are actually affected by these limits?

While it's impossible to say how many people would like to donate an unlimited amount of money but don't because the limits exist, we do know that only a very small handful of people even come close to reaching those limits.

Few people make substantial political contributions at all. Out of an estimated 310 million Americans, we estimate that just 0.4 percent make a political contribution of $200 or more (large enough to be individually tracked in FEC data). And even among those who give more than that, only about 0.1 percent give $2,500 or more.

The number of donors who max out on the overall cap for donations is much smaller. According to CRP data, only 591 donors in the entire country - or 0.0000019 percent of the population -- gave the maximum of $46,200 to federal candidates in 2012, accounting for only $34.1 million of the estimated $3.1 billion raised by federal candidates in the cycle.

Based on data released by the FEC on November, 14, 2013.