[infamouscow]

This would mean that all media companies in the US would be prevented from publishing anything that could be perceived as negative about any candidate running for elected office, regardless of factual basis and regardless of if it were satire.

A candidate would simply go to any circuit court judge and get an injunction against the media company. If the media company did not comply, the judge would find the officers in contempt. Marshals would then arrest and throw the companies officers in jail indefinitely until they complied.

That's what you're asking for. It's genuinely stupid. I say this as someone that would declare a national emergency on day 1 of being elected just to have the Air Force turn most media company HQs into smoldering craters.

[larksimian]

Yes, election coverage and endorsements and politically biased media did not exist before Citizens United. None of the dozens of democracies with political spending limits have political news coverage.

You really cracked this case wide open, Sherlock.

[vitally3643]

Slippery slope fallacies are not good foundations to make a reasoned argument on.

[xboxnolifes]

It doesn't have to, there are tons of restrictions that could be used to improve the status quo. Limiting how close to an election these things can be released. Limiting how much money an individual can contribute. Limiting how much money a single organization can spend. We have levers, we choose not to use them.

[danny_codes]

Except that's not how it was in 2004 before Citizens United. So.. yes, in your made up hypothetical it doesn't look good. But in reality, where we all live, it worked better than the current rules

[infamouscow]

Yes, had SCOTUS ruled differently in Citizens United, the scope of the ruling would have likely been narrowly focused.

Every time SCOTUS makes a ruling, there are thousands of extremely talented activist lawyers that immediate begin working on legal strategies to further expand a ruling in ways they believe are favorable to their political ends. You have to understand, there are lawyers who focus on specific justices and study the idiosyncrasies of their rulings/philosophy so they can reverse-engineer legal outcomes as they desire.

In United States v. Jones, Ginsburg and Thomas ruled that attaching a GPS tracker to a car and monitoring it was a Fourth Amendment search. Thomas believes physically attaching the device is a property trespass and constitutes a search. Ginsburg believed prolonged GPS surveillance violates a reasonable expectation of privacy.

Even though Ginsburg and Thomas are polar opposites, if you understand how they rule, you can still get the outcome you want with the right case.