A federal appeals court in Boston heard arguments Wednesday about the constitutionality of a 2-year-old campaign finance law in Maine.
The case deals with contributions to so-called super PACs, which now spend billions of dollars each year on elections nationwide to influence voters. And supporters of Maine’s law are hoping to push the case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
“We’re in a different world and I think that justifies taking a new look at this,” Jonathan Bolton, an assistant attorney general for Maine, told judges on the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
In November 2024, Maine voters were deeply divided over who they supported for president, for Congress and for seats in the state Legislature. But one issue on the ballot that fall appeared to unite many Mainers across the political spectrum. Three quarters of voters approved a referendum making Maine the first state in the nation to limit how much individuals or organizations can contribute to so-called super PACs.
That $5,000 contribution cap has never been enforced because two conservative Maine-based PACs, Dinner Table Action and For Our Future, immediately challenged its constitutionality. And on Wednesday, attorneys for both sides made their arguments in a case with potential national implications.
“When the people of Maine decided by the largest vote in the state’s 206-year history that unlimited super PAC contributions were corrupting our elections, did the First Amendment leave them powerless? It did not,” said Neal Katyal, an attorney for the Massachusetts-based group Equal Citizens that helped get the issue before Maine voters two years ago.
Super PACs are political committees that make independent expenditures to support or oppose candidates. Under federal law, they can’t collaborate with a candidate’s campaign. But Equal Citizens contends that behind-the-scenes coordination happens all too frequently. And Katyal said federal law caps direct donations to candidates at $7,000 a year, but there’s no limit on how much you can give to a super PAC.
“People now, if they want to buy influence, they don’t make the direct donations,” he said. “Because all they have to do is donate it to this candidate-aligned super PAC and there are no limits.”
Super PACs were a byproduct of the Supreme Court’s controversial 2010 decision in Citizens United allowing corporations, labor unions and other groups to spend unlimited amounts of money on elections. Three months later, a federal appellate court in Washington, D.C., followed suit in the case known as SpeechNOW, throwing out contribution limits on independent-expenditure groups.
Since then, contributions to super PACs have exploded from $86 million to nearly $7 billion. But the Supreme Court has never examined the super PAC contributions issue. And Bolton with the Maine attorney general’s office said it is time the court does, given the massive amounts of money being spent to influence voters.
“It is a thing of value for a candidate to receive these massive donations to a super PAC that they know is going to be running ads either to support them or oppose their opponent,” Bolton said. “That is sort of the new world that we live in. None of these other courts have had the occasion to consider it.”
But federal courts, from the Supreme Court on down, have consistently held in recent decades that campaign contributions and spending are a form of constitutionally protected free speech. In fact, just last month, the Supreme Court struck down a federal law that limited how much political parties can spend in coordination with candidates’ campaigns, ruling that the restrictions violated the First Amendment.
Charles Miller, an attorney from the Institute for Free Speech, argued that because super PACs must operate independently of candidate campaigns, there can be no illegal “this for that” dealmaking.
“You have to have that quid pro quo — you know like, ‘Hey, I’m going to give you this money — do this for me.'” Miller told the judges. “You need that ‘do this for me’ and the agreement of the candidate.”
Several of the judges pressed Miller on the fact that the courts have allowed governments to limit direct contributions to candidates because large contributions could create the “appearance” of quid pro quo corruption. But Miller told Judge Seth Aframe that in order for there to even be an appearance of wrongdoing, that supposedly independent money would have to end up being directly controlled by the candidate or their campaign.
“Because the Supreme Court says anything else is simply influence and access and ingratiation,” Miller said. “And no matter how ugly people that is, it’s constitutionally protected.”
If the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals sides with Equal Citizens and upholds Maine’s law, the case would likely be reviewed by the Supreme Court.
This story appears through a media partnership with Maine Public.