22 states join campaign finance fight

HELENA, Mont. -- Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia are backing Montana in its fight to prevent the U.S. Supreme Court's 2010 Citizens United decision from being used to strike down state laws restricting corporate campaign spending.

The states, led by New York, are asking the high court to preserve Montana's state-level regulations on corporate political expenditures, according to Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's office and obtained by The Associated Press. The brief will be released to the public today.

The Supreme Court is being asked to reverse a state court's decision to uphold the Montana law. Virginia-based American Tradition Partnership is asking the nation's high court to rule without a hearing because the group says the state law conflicts directly with the Citizens United decision that removed the federal ban on corporate campaign spending.

The Supreme Court has blocked the Montana law until it can look at the case.

The Montana case has prompted critics to hope the court will reverse itself on the controversial Citizens United ruling.

The 22 states and D.C. say the Montana law is sharply different from the federal issues in the Citizens United case, so the ruling shouldn't apply to Montana's or other state laws regulating corporate campaign spending.

But the states also said they would support a Supreme Court decision to reconsider portions of the Citizens United ruling, either in a future case or in the Montana case, if the justices decide to take it on.

Legal observers say don't count on the Supreme Court reconsidering its decision.

"It is highly unlikely that the Court would reverse its decision in Citizens United," said law professor Richard L. Hasen of the University of California-Irvine.