National Republican Senatorial Committee v. Federal Election Commission (6th Cir. appeal)

Applying heightened scrutiny to the party-candidate coordination limit, the Court found that the government's anticorruption interest—preventing quid pro quo corruption—did not justify restricting political parties' spending with their own candidates, as such entities share aligned political interests rather than posing independent corruption risks to each other. The Court rejected the government's alternative rationale that the limit prevents parties from circumventing candidate contribution restrictions, finding this concern speculative and insufficient to satisfy the strict tailoring required by First Amendment doctrine. Because the restriction was not closely drawn to target actual corruption between parties and their own candidates, it failed heightened scrutiny.