RangerMIke
Master Don Juan
I did not say Super PACs... I said PACs... and yes they did rule that PACs were entitled to free speech protection, but are limited on what they can collect from individual donors. As far as I know the USSC has not ruled on Super PACS since technically they did not exist until after Citizens United.The SCOTUS did not rule that Super PACS have the same rights as individuals.
They ruled that corporations and unions do. Although I disagree with that ruling.
A Super PAC is a committee not really an organization and they can advertise on 'issues' they can even pay for ads for an issue they support, however they are NOT allowed to endorse or support in any way any particular candidate. They can raise unlimited amounts of money from any individual. "Swift Boat Vets for Truth" was a PAC that operated like a Super PAC before they really existed, and they accepted contributions over legal limits. They technically did not support GHW Bush, all they did was attack then Senator Kerry's record in Vietnam, and his protest actions after he returned from Vietnam. It was defacto support for Bush and it was VERY effective and mostly legal, but they did have to pay a fine, which was WAY less than what they collected.
A PAC can not coordinate with a campaign, but they are allowed to donate money to individual campaigns and parties, but these have contribution limits. I actually worked on McCain's 2008 campaign and again on Romney's campaign in 2012. I can tell you that campaigns are VERY careful with what they can and can not do with PACs... they can't have anything at all to do with S-PACs... the fastest way to get removed from a political campaign is to even suggest you MIGHT have contact with a S-PAC. Super PACS didn't even really exist during the 2008 election, but you can argue that Citizens United created them. and they were around in 2012 during the Romney campaign.
One of the criticisms I heard during the Romney campaign was that Mitt was overly concerned with Super PACs, that he was overly cautious, and to be honest... I think he was. They would frequently go out of their way to make sure that there was no perception of working with them AT ALL, even going so far as to pull ad campaigns out of markets we had planned to run when a Super PAC started running ads in that same market with even a similar message. We basically hamstrung ourselves in a lot of markets, and while I am not sure if it would have had an effect on the results... it certainly didn't help.
During the last election, IMO since I did not work for either campaign, Super PACs had little impact on the results. Super PACS supporting Clinton actually raised more money than Trump.... by almost 3:1. Overall, Clinton raised a half a billion more in 2016, than Trump and she spent almost every dollar, while Trump who raised just under a billion after the election he still had about $7 million left over. Trump actually ran a very efficient campaign. You can argue that the Super PACS supporting Trump were more effective... but I'm really not sure that it was that they did a good job of shaping the narrative as S-PACs support Hillary were just bloody awful. Trumps S-Pacs mercilessly attacked Hillary on everything... Clinton's S-PACs ran ads about how great it would be to have a chick in the White House, or attack ads on Trump critical of things he did with women which were arguably no worst than Bill Clinton... it was really stupid because all it did was ask the question who is worst... the guy who had a misogynistic attitude about women, or the women that tolerated the same behavior from her husband... and at least Trump paid off his chicks... while Bill and Hillary just tossed them under the bus. Hillary's S-PACS just wasted money in markets they already owned.