Political action committee is a group set up to contribute money to candidates in the United States. Political action committees, often called PAC’s, were first established in the 1940’s. They began because U.S. law did not allow certain organizations, such as labor unions or corporations, to make contributions directly to candidates.
Most PAC’s are created by organizations and funded by that organization’s employees or members. Such PAC’s are called separate segregated funds. A smaller number of PAC’s are known as nonconnected committees. These groups have no connection to any one organization. Often nonconnected committees are formed around a political idea, such as opposition to taxes. Both types of PAC’s have strict limits as to how much money any one individual can contribute to them.
In 2010, a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States, Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, held that the U.S. government had no right to limit the amounts that unions and corporations could contribute to support or oppose candidates. This case led to the development of super PAC’s that accepted huge donations. Super PAC’s could not coordinate their activities with candidates, but they could finance advertising praising or attacking them.
Many Americans believed that PAC’s had gained too much influence over American politics. They believed that, in order to raise campaign funds, officeholders sometimes gave more attention to issues that concerned PAC’s than to those that concerned ordinary citizens.
