Federal Election Comm'n v. Wisconsin Right to Life

Section 203 of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA) made it a federal crime for a corporation to broadcast, close to an election, a communication naming a federal candidate and targeted at voters. In McConnell v. FEC, the Court had already upheld section 203 against corporate speech that was the functional equivalent of express campaign advocacy, but left open whether it could validly reach pure issue ads. In 2004, Wisconsin Right to Life (defendant) ran ads urging constituents to protest the Senate's filibuster of judicial nominees, and the FEC (plaintiff) sued to block the ads under section 203; the district court found no compelling state interest justifying the restriction, and the FEC appealed.