## Facts

- SpeechNow.org, an unincorporated nonprofit association, was formed to engage in express advocacy supporting federal candidates who shared its views.
- SpeechNow planned to accept contributions only from individuals (not corporations or unions) and to fund only independent expenditures, not candidate contributions or coordinated spending.
- FEC staff issued a draft advisory opinion indicating SpeechNow would be treated as a “political committee” under FECA once it raised or spent more than $1,000, triggering contribution limits and PAC-style compliance.
- SpeechNow and individual donors sued, challenging FECA’s limits on contributions to political committees and FECA’s political-committee registration and reporting regime as applied to an independent-expenditure-only group.
- The district court denied preliminary injunctive relief and upheld the limits under intermediate scrutiny; the court certified constitutional questions to the D.C. Circuit sitting en banc.
- While the appeal was pending, the Supreme Court decided *Citizens United v. FEC*, which the D.C. Circuit treated as controlling on the corruption rationale for independent spending.

## Issues

1. Whether FECA’s limits on individuals’ contributions to political committees are constitutional as applied to contributions to an independent-expenditure-only committee that does not contribute to, or coordinate with, candidates.
2. Whether FECA’s political-committee organizational requirements and reporting/disclosure provisions may constitutionally be applied to an independent-expenditure-only committee.

## Decision

- The en banc D.C. Circuit held FECA’s contribution limits unconstitutional as applied to individuals’ contributions to SpeechNow.
- The court upheld application of FECA’s political-committee registration, organizational, and reporting/disclosure requirements to SpeechNow.
- The court vacated the district court’s order denying injunctive relief and remanded for proceedings consistent with its ruling.

## Legal Principles

- Preventing quid pro quo corruption or its appearance is the principal governmental interest that can justify limits on political contributions.
- Because independent expenditures do not create quid pro quo corruption or its appearance, the government lacks an anti-corruption interest sufficient to limit contributions to committees that make only independent expenditures and do not coordinate with candidates.
- “Closely drawn” review for contribution limits still requires a valid anti-corruption rationale; interests such as equalizing influence or “anti-distortion” cannot justify the limits.
- Political-committee registration, organizational requirements, and disclosure/reporting obligations may be applied to independent-expenditure-only committees because disclosure burdens are generally less restrictive than contribution caps and serve sufficiently important informational and enforcement interests.

## Conclusion

The D.C. Circuit invalidated FECA’s limits on individual donations to independent-expenditure-only political committees while sustaining FECA’s PAC-style registration and disclosure rules for such committees, enabling unlimited individual fundraising for independent expenditures subject to transparency requirements.


SpeechNow.org v. Fed. Election Comm’n, 599 F.3d 686 (D.C. Cir. 2010) (en banc)