The ultra-rich poured more money into the last presidential election than ever before. Tesla founder, X owner and President-elect Donald Trump’s right-hand man, Elon Musk, gave $239 million alone to his own Trump-supporting America PAC and in total spent over $250 million to help Trump win. Billionaire Michael Bloomberg donated $50 million to Future Forward PAC, a group supporting the Democratic ticket. Howard Lutnick, a cryptocurrency billionaire whom Trump recently tapped to be Commerce secretary, donated $5 million to MAGA Inc., according to FEC filings.
An analysis from the Brennan Center for Justice found that wealthy donors who gave more than $5 million to super PACs supporting Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris donated a combined $864 million in 2024, more than double the amount they gave in 2020. Billionaires across the country opened their wallets to support the candidate of their choosing, a stark reminder of the power special interests hold in American elections.
But in the small state of Maine, home to just over a million people, voters sought to curb that power. On Nov. 5, Maine residents passed Question 1, a ballot initiative that limits the amount an individual or business can donate to a Political Action Committee to $5,000. The law went into effect on Dec. 1, establishing the first-ever limit on the amount an individual or group can donate to a super PAC.
The law was almost immediately the subject of legal challenges that could see the issue end up before the Supreme Court, which will be in a position to either restore governments’ ability to curtail the flow of money into politics or cement the power of dark money and the ultra-rich.
“We are entitled to a system that’s not only free of corruption, but also a system that is free of the appearance of corruption,” Cara McCormick, leader of the group Citizens to End Super PACs in Maine that led the campaign, told Salon.
The initiative passed with 74% of the vote and the state has been lauded for rejecting dark money’s incredibly vast influence in American politics.
“In a year when special interests flooded our elections with more cash than ever before, Maine voters just delivered a stunning rejection of the big money status quo,” Joshua Lynn, CEO of the non-profit group RepresentUs, said in a statement. “This victory is a testament to the hard work of Maine Citizens to End Super PACs and the other grassroots organizers who worked to make it possible. Taking on big money is no easy task, but the people of Maine made their voices loud and clear.”
Despite nearly three-quarters of voters approving Question 1, the initiative has been criticized by those who argue that political donations are a form of expression, including the Institute for Free Speech, an organization dedicated to protecting First Amendment rights through litigation and advocacy.
In an op-ed for the Portland Herald Press, David Keating, president of the Institute for Free Speech, argued that Question 1 is “unconstitutional” and “counterproductive.”
“By attempting to limit contributions to independent expenditure-only organizations, the proposed Maine measure directly and clearly contradicts our rights as Americans under the First Amendment,” he wrote. “It infringes on our rights to organize into groups and express our opinions on a matter of the utmost public concern – the question of who will run the government.” Keating added that the measure would “obviously lead to less speech and less information for voters” and give “an advantage to incumbent politicians.”
On Dec. 13, Question 1 was officially challenged by two conservative groups, Dinner Table Action and For Our Future. They argue that super PAC donations are “a vital feature of our democracy.”
“All Americans, not just those running for office, have a fundamental First Amendment right to talk about political campaigns,” the federal lawsuit reads “Their ‘independent expenditures,’ payments that fund political expression by those who are not running for office but nonetheless have something to say about a campaign, are a vital feature of our democracy.”
The lawsuit names as defendants Maine’s attorney general and the Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices, which is reviewing the complaint, the Associated Press reported.
Though super PACs have come to define American politics in the last decade, they didn’t exist before 2010. The rules around contributions to political action committees were much stricter: individuals could give no more than $2,500 and corporations and unions were prevented from donating.
Two court cases in 2010 led to the creation of super PACs and laid the foundation for an electoral system that privileges the rich. First was Citizens United v. FEC, in which a conservative non-profit group, Citizens United, challenged campaign finance rules after the Federal Election Commission prevented it from airing a critical film about Hilary Clinton right before the presidential primaries.
The Supreme Court ruled for Citizens United, establishing that any limit on “independent political spending” from corporations and other groups violates the right to free speech. In other words, groups could now spend as much as they wanted on elections because they were entitled to do so under the First Amendment.
In a separate case just two months later, Speechnow v. FEC, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit decided that if PAC spending could not be limited because of the right to free speech, neither could individual contributions to a PAC. Elites and special interests could donate without limit, blurring the already murky lines between a political campaign and those who finance it.
Campaign spending soon skyrocketed. In 2010, there were 81 super PACs that raised a combined $89 million. Just two years later, 1,261 super PACs raised over $828 million during the 2012 election, an 89% increase. By 2016, super PAC donations topped $1 billion — and this year, super PACs raised a record $5 billion, according to Open Secrets.
While super PACs are legally required to disclose their donors, politically active nonprofits that donate to super PACs are not. These groups are often referred to as “dark money” groups, because wealthy special interests can spend as much as they please to exercise political influence while remaining hidden from the public. Many super PACs work closely with dark money groups to conceal the true source of their funding.
For example, the Future Forward PAC raised nearly $400 million to support the Harris campaign. The PAC received half of that from its “dark money” non-profit arm, Future Forward USA Action. It was later revealed that billionaire Bill Gates quietly made a $50 million donation to the group, though they were not required to disclose this information publicly.
In an interview with Salon, Harvard University law professor Lawrence Lessig said super PAC funding has fundamentally altered the way political candidates can run their campaigns. If a candidate is funded predominantly by super PAC money, they will inherently be cautious about what they say so as not to upset their funders, Lessig said.
Harris, Lessig argued, “was very cautious about talking about issues that might upset super PACs that were funding her.”
“She wasn’t able to talk about issues in a way that would inspire the working class, because, surprise, surprise, the issues that inspire the working class are not the issues the super PACs are keen to support,” he added.
Super PACs have allowed just a handful of elites to sway American politics, which has led to a trail of corruption and conflicting interests, Lessig argued.
“This incredibly small number of people have an extraordinary veto power over the ability of politicians or legislators to do what they want to do. And that dynamic — this concentrated veto power — is the thing that I think is the corrupting influence here,” he said.
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Lessig has spent much of the last 10 years fighting the corrupt nature of super PACs, which he says were formed only because of a “legal error” made in the 2010 ruling of Speechnow v. FEC. When the D.C. Circuit ruled that contributions to independent spending committees could not be regulated, they did so on the grounds that PAC contributions “cannot corrupt or create the appearance of corruption.” In other words, it was not possible for donors to bribed by politicians in exchange for contributions.
But in 2015, former U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez, D-NJ., was criminally charged for offering official favors to a Florida doctor in exchange for contributing to Menendez’s PAC, showing that PAC contributions could in fact be corrupt. Lessig believes this case invalidates the Supreme Court’s reasoning. He has long argued that if SCOTUS ever reviews the case, it will correct this ruling, restoring both states and the federal government the power to limit contributions.
“That question has not been presented, and I’ve been working in a lot of contexts to try to tee it up, to get it presented, and we’ve not been able to get it to the court. The Maine initiative is an enormous opportunity,” Lessig said.
For McCormick, the legal challenges facing Question 1 are daunting, but she knows the outcome could be worth it.
“If you get challenged and then you win, that is the Holy Grail, right?” McCormick said.
Though the initiative faces a long road to the nation’s top court and may not be upheld when it gets there, both McCormick and Lessig said Question 1’s overwhelming support shows that voters care about dark money in politics and, when given the chance, they want change.
“The strength of our citizen democracy is real, right? We believe that we have the agency to fix something that’s broken,” McCormick said.
