The Supreme Court's 6-3 ruling in NRSC v. FEC overturns Colorado II and removes all federal caps on coordinated party-to-candidate spending, reshaping the 2026 midterms.
The Supreme Court struck down federal limits on coordinated expenditures between national political party committees and their candidates on June 30, ruling 6-3 that the restrictions unconstitutionally burden First Amendment-protected political speech [1]. Justice Brett Kavanaugh authored the majority opinion, which holds that party committees have a right to spend in coordination with candidates without the expenditure ceilings imposed by the Federal Election Campaign Act [2]. The ruling takes effect immediately, with the 2026 midterm election cycle already underway.
The case, NRSC v. FEC, was brought by the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee, which challenged the FECA coordination limits as applied to their candidate support activities [1]. The Federal Election Commission defended the caps as a necessary check on corruption, or the appearance of corruption, between parties and their nominees [3]. The Democratic National Committee also participated in proceedings opposing the challenge [2]. The suit moved through the federal courts before the justices granted certiorari and heard argument earlier this term.
The ruling directly overturns Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Committee v. FEC, 533 U.S. 431 (2001), known as Colorado II, which had upheld coordinated expenditure limits as a constitutional means of preventing circumvention of contribution caps [1]. By overruling Colorado II, the majority erases the last major structural restraint on how much a national party may spend in direct coordination with a candidate, a category of spending long treated as legally distinct from, and more regulable than, independent expenditures [2]. Justice Elena Kagan, joined by Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson, dissented, warning that the decision permits party committees to function as supplemental campaign treasuries for individual nominees [3]. The dissenters argued the majority misread both the anticorruption rationale underlying FECA and the Court's own prior precedents on coordinated spending [2].
Practically, the decision reopens coordinated spending channels that had been capped at amounts ranging from roughly $50,000 to several million dollars per race depending on the state and office [3]. Party committees may now direct unlimited coordinated dollars toward favored candidates, concentrating financial influence within the formal party structure rather than in outside super PACs [1]. The FEC is expected to issue updated compliance guidance in the coming weeks [2]. Campaigns and party committees are anticipated to restructure fundraising and disbursement operations before the November 2026 elections, and litigation over the ruling's downstream effects on state-level coordination limits is considered likely [3].