# Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA / McCain-Feingold) **Type:** Federal law (P.L. 107-155) **Signed:** March 27, 2002 by [[George W. Bush]] **Sponsors:** Senators [[John McCain]] (R-AZ) and Russ Feingold (D-WI); Representatives Christopher Shays (R-CT) and Marty Meehan (D-MA) The Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 — universally known as **McCain-Feingold** for its principal Senate sponsors — was the most ambitious post-Watergate attempt to close the loopholes that had opened in the [[Federal Election Campaign Act]] framework since the [[Buckley v. Valeo]] (1976) ruling. BCRA had two principal substantive objectives: closing the **soft money** loophole that the 1979 FECA Amendments had created, and regulating **issue advertising** that thinly disguised candidate advocacy as policy discussion. BCRA was upheld in *McConnell v. FEC* (2003) and then substantially gutted across a decade of subsequent litigation. By 2014, the principal operative restrictions BCRA had imposed were either struck down ([[FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life]] 2007 on electioneering communications; [[Citizens United v. FEC]] 2010 on corporate independent expenditures; [[Davis v. FEC]] 2008 on the Millionaire's Amendment; [[McCutcheon v. FEC]] 2014 on aggregate contribution limits) or substantially evaded through doctrinal workarounds. The Act remains on the books; most of its substantive teeth have been removed. ## What BCRA Did The Act's principal substantive provisions: ### Soft Money Ban (Title I) The 1979 [[Federal Election Campaign Act]] Amendments had created an exception permitting national party committees to raise unlimited funds for "party-building" activities — voter registration, get-out-the-vote operations, generic party advertising. This **soft money** loophole had grown by 2000 to dwarf the regulated "hard money" framework: the Democratic and Republican national party committees had each raised more than $200 million in soft money in the 2000 cycle, much of it in six- and seven-figure individual and corporate contributions that would have been prohibited if given directly to candidates. BCRA Title I prohibited national party committees from raising, receiving, or spending soft money. National party committees can now only raise hard money — federally-regulated contributions subject to FECA limits. The soft-money ban remains in force; this part of BCRA has not been struck down. ### Electioneering Communications (Title II) The Act defined a new category of regulated political speech: **electioneering communications** — broadcast advertisements referring to a clearly identified federal candidate, aired within 30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election, targeted to the relevant electorate. Such ads were subject to disclosure requirements and (for corporate and union spending) the existing prohibition on funding from general treasury funds. The electioneering-communications restriction was designed to close the "magic words" loophole that *Buckley* had created — issue advertising that did not formally call for a candidate's election or defeat but that, in practice, was indistinguishable from candidate advertising in its targeting and timing. The restriction was upheld in *McConnell v. FEC* (2003) but substantially gutted in [[FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life]] (2007) and effectively eliminated for corporate spending by [[Citizens United v. FEC]] (2010). ### Stand By Your Ad BCRA required candidates appearing in their own ads to verbally identify themselves and approve the ad's content ("I'm [Candidate Name] and I approved this message"). This provision was designed to discourage negative attack ads by associating them more directly with their sponsoring candidates. The provision remains in force and is the source of the now-universal "approved by" tag-line in American political advertising. ### Millionaire's Amendment The Act included an asymmetric contribution-limit adjustment: when a candidate self-funded above a statutory threshold, the contribution caps that applied to *opponents* were raised. The provision was designed to provide a counterweight to the self-funding advantage [[Buckley v. Valeo]] had created. The Supreme Court struck down the Millionaire's Amendment in [[Davis v. FEC]] (2008) on [[First Amendment]] grounds. ### Other Provisions - Raised individual contribution limits from $1,000 to $2,000 per candidate per election (indexed for inflation thereafter; in 2026 the limit is $3,300) - Raised aggregate individual contribution limit (later struck down by [[McCutcheon v. FEC]]) - Prohibited "soft money" contributions to state and local party committees for federal election activity - Strengthened disclosure requirements for electioneering communications ## The Dismantling BCRA was the high-water mark of post-Watergate campaign-finance reform. Within twelve years of its enactment, substantial portions had been struck down: | Case | Year | Provision struck | |---|---|---| | [[McConnell v. FEC]] | 2003 | (BCRA *upheld* in initial constitutional challenge) | | [[FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life]] | 2007 | Electioneering communications restriction effectively gutted for "issue ads" | | [[Davis v. FEC]] | 2008 | Millionaire's Amendment struck down | | [[Citizens United v. FEC]] | 2010 | Corporate and union independent expenditures protected; BCRA prohibition struck | | [[McCutcheon v. FEC]] | 2014 | Aggregate individual contribution limits (raised by BCRA) struck down | The pattern: the Roberts Court's First Amendment campaign-finance jurisprudence systematically dismantled BCRA. The principal substantive provision that survives is the **soft money ban**, which has not been challenged at the Supreme Court (likely because the dark-money architecture that emerged after *Citizens United* substitutes for the soft-money mechanism in any case — donors who would have given soft money to party committees in 2000 now give to 501(c)(4)s and [[Super PACs]] in 2020). ## Significance for the KB BCRA's trajectory is one of the cleanest illustrations in American political history of how the [[Federalist Society]] judicial pipeline produced campaign-finance outcomes that elected legislatures could not undo. BCRA was passed by bipartisan majorities — 60-40 in the Senate, 240-189 in the House — and was signed by a Republican President. By 2014, the conservative legal movement's judicial appointments had largely dismantled it. Congress has not seriously attempted post-2014 campaign-finance reform, in substantial part because the [[Buckley v. Valeo]] / *Citizens United* / [[McCutcheon v. FEC]] doctrinal framework leaves little room for new statutory restrictions. The McCain-Feingold experience also illustrates a pattern observable across the contemporary administrative state: **constitutional dismantling outpaces legislative repair**. Statutes that took years to pass have been struck down or substantially gutted in single Supreme Court terms, with no realistic legislative path to restoration. The combination of [[Federalist Society]] judicial appointments and a polarized Congress means that statutes constraining the donor class have a narrow window of effectiveness between enactment and judicial dismantling. ## See Also - [[Federal Election Campaign Act]] — 1971/1974 framework BCRA amended - [[Buckley v. Valeo]] — 1976 case BCRA tried to work within - [[McConnell v. FEC]] — 2003 case upholding BCRA - [[FEC v. Wisconsin Right to Life]] — 2007 case gutting electioneering communications restriction - [[Davis v. FEC]] — 2008 case striking the Millionaire's Amendment - [[Citizens United v. FEC]] — 2010 case dismantling corporate independent-expenditure restrictions - [[McCutcheon v. FEC]] — 2014 case striking aggregate contribution limits - [[Soft Money]] — the mechanism BCRA Title I closed - [[Electioneering Communication]] — the category BCRA Title II created - [[Federal Election Commission]] — modern enforcement agency - [[Campaign Finance Timeline]] — full chronological view - [[Campaign Finance]] — Foundations hub