Cite as: 572 U. S. ____ (2014) 31 Opinion of ROBERTS, C. J. marshaled to capture perfectly the counterfactual world in which aggregate limits do not exist. But, as we have noted elsewhere, we can nonetheless ask “whether experience under the present law confirms a serious threat of abuse.” Federal Election Comm’n v. Colorado Republican Federal Campaign Comm., 533 U. S. 431, 457 (2001). It does not. Experience suggests that the vast majority of contributions made in excess of the aggregate limits are likely to be retained and spent by their recipients rather than rerouted to candidates. In the 2012 election cycle, federal candidates, political parties, and PACs spent a total of $7 billion, according to the FEC. In particular, each national political party’s spending ran in the hundreds of millions of dollars. The National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC), National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC), however, spent less than $1 million each on direct candidate contributions and less than $10 million each on coordinated expenditures. Brief for NRSC et al. as Amici Curiae 23, 25 (NRSC Brief). Including both coordinated expenditures and direct candidate contributions, the NRSC and DSCC spent just 7% of their total funds on contributions to candidates and the NRCC and DCCC spent just 3%. Likewise, as explained previously, state parties rarely contribute to candidates in other States. In the 2012 election cycle, the Republican and Democratic state party committees in all 50 States (and the District of Columbia) contributed a paltry $17,750 to House and Senate candidates in other States. The state party committees spent over half a billion dollars over the same time period, of which the $17,750 in contributions to other States’ candidates constituted just 0.003%. As with national and state party committees, candidates