Latest Developments:
- Court Upholds Arizona ‘Dark Money’ Law: An appeals court in Arizona unanimously upheld Proposition 211. The Arizona Free Enterprise Club and the Center for Arizona Policy had argued that Arizona’s requirement to disclose donors of at least $5,000 violated the constitutional rights of those donors.
- FEC Investigates Turning Point Action: Having found reason to believe that Turning Point Action had failed to disclose $33,795 in contributions with respect to the 2020 presidential election, the FEC has invited the group to enter into negotiations directed toward reaching a conciliation agreement.
- San Francisco’s Proposition D Changes the Gift Landscape: The City and County of San Francisco Ethics Commission has described how Proposition D, which recently passed in San Francisco, will expand the definitions of “restricted source” and “doing business with the city,” and how it also rewrites the gift code, such that San Francisco now no longer follows state law exceptions to the gift rule.
- Maine Installs Contribution Limits to PACS: The Maine Morning Star reports that Maine residents voted to set a $5,000 limit for giving to political action committees that spend money independently to support or defeat candidates for office; legal scholar and political activist Lawrence Lessig acknowledges that the ultimate goal is getting the Supreme Court to rule on super PACs.
- Los Angeles Ethics Changes: Los Angeles recently passed Measure ER, which sets an annual budget for the Ethics Commission, prevents commissioners from appointing family members or major contributors, and triples fines for ethics violations, which will now be $15,000 instead of $5,000.
- Newsom Fined for Late Reports: California’s Governor Gavin Newsom has agreed to pay a $13,000 fine for failing to timely file reports of behested payments from the regulated community. The Enforcement Division of the FPPC noted 18 separate occasions in which corporate, nonprofit, and foundation donors gave in amounts ranging from $5,000 to over $12,000,000.
In Case You Missed It:
- No Ethics Pledge from Trump: The New York Times reports that President-elect Donald J. Trump has not yet submitted documents required under the Presidential Transition Act in part because of concerns over a mandatory ethics pledge.
- Longtime Lobbyist Sentenced: As reported by the Los Angeles Daily News, a longtime Los Angeles lobbyist and former City Hall official was sentenced to 6 months’ home detention after pleading guilty to agreeing to vote against a project in exchange for a $50,000 donation by a developer to a PAC.
- Adams Aide Steers Deal to Contributor: From Yahoo! News, an aide of embattled New York City mayor Eric Adams overruled an internal bidding process in favor of a frequent political donor.
- Prince George County Councilmember Gets Prison Sentence: As reported by MSN, a former Prince George County, Maryland, councilmember was sentenced to a year in prison after he admitted to stealing $124,450.10 from his campaign to finance, among other things, personal loans and credit card debt, his personal rent, cosmetic procedures for himself and a friend, and personal subscriptions.
- Federal Judge Agrees New Mexico Ban is Too Wide: From Yahoo! News, a New Mexico state senator who faced investigation by the State Ethics Commission over a $200 donation for a high school student’s summer workshop in 2019, obtained a preliminary injunction from a federal judge against the rule that political candidates may use campaign funds to make charitable donations to nonprofit organizations that fall under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code but not to individuals; the judge found that the secretary of state offered no evidence to show that a ban on giving charitable contributions to individuals was enacted to prevent quid pro quo corruption.