SE - What Does The FPPC Do?

Minor Changes to the Act and Cleanup – (AB 2001 (Gallagher) – Chapter 97, Statues of 2024.)

This bill contains three corrections and clarifications on the application of the Act. Local Agency Duties: To clarify local government agency duties, this bill requires late filings to be posted within 72 hours of receipt, provides that local agencies need not post filings erroneously filed with the agency, and applies online posting requirements to filings received by email or fax. Ad Disclosures: This bill revises the permissible text type in print advertisement disclosures to standard Arial Regular instead of Arial equivalent type and requires that the disclosure area not contain any text or image that is not required by any applicable law. Nonsubstantive Clean-up: This bill repeals Section 82052.5 of the Act defining “statewide election” and corrects a citation cross-referenced in a bill passed by the Legislature in 2017, which revised the definition of “campaign expenditures.” Operative on January 1, 2025.

Use of Campaign Funds for Security Expenses – (AB 2041 (Bonta) – Chapter 372, Statues of 2024.)

This bill expands permitted campaign fund use for home or office electronic security systems under specified conditions to also include payments for the reasonable costs of providing personal security and for other tangible items related to security for the candidate, official, elected officer, their immediate family or staff. This bill specifically does not authorize the use of campaign funds for security if the payment would be made to a relative or used for firearms. Verification: This bill repeals the previous verification requirements, which included that the threats be reported and verified by law enforcement. Instead, the bill requires that the security expenses be in response to threats arising from their activities, duties, or status as a candidate or elected officer or staff member thereto. This bill also requires a candidate or elected officer to submit a report to the FPPC, signed under penalty of perjury, that describes and verifies the threat or potential threat that necessitated the expenditure or reimbursement. Lifetime Cap: The bill imposes a lifetime expenditure limit of $10,000 per person for a candidate or elected officer for these security expenses, regardless of holding or running for multiple offices. Return or Reimbursement: This bill requires either the return of, or reimbursement for, the security system equipment and any other tangible items purchased with campaign funds within one year of when the official is no longer in office or the candidate is no longer a candidate for the office for which the security equipment was purchased, or, if applicable, upon sale of the property on which the security equipment is located, whichever occurs sooner. If the threat is ongoing, return or reimbursement is within one year of the threat ceasing or upon the sale of the property, whichever is sooner. The bill requires candidates and elected officers to maintain certain detailed records and to report expenditures and any reimbursement under these provisions on the candidate or elected officer’s campaign statements. Operative on September 22, 2024.

Disclaimer for Campaign Advertisements that use Artificial Intelligence – (AB 2355 (Carrillo and Cervantes) – Chapter 260, Statues of 2024.)

Requires a committee that creates, originally publishes, or originally distributes a political advertisement that is an image, audio, or video that was generated or substantially altered using artificial intelligence, as defined, to include on the advertisement a disclosure that the advertisement was generated or substantially altered using artificial intelligence. The bill prescribes formatting requirements for this disclosure depending on the medium of the qualified political advertisement. This bill specifies that an image, audio, video, or other media is generated or substantially altered using artificial intelligence if either it was entirely created using artificial intelligence and would falsely appear to a reasonable person to be authentic, or it was materially altered by artificial intelligence such that a reasonable person would have a fundamentally different understanding of the altered media when comparing it to an unaltered version. Exclusion: This bill excludes an advertisement from the disclaimer requirement if the media was immaterially altered by artificial intelligence, including a cosmetic adjustment, color edit, cropped image, or resized image. Enforcement: The bill authorizes the FPPC to enforce a violation of the disclosure requirements by seeking injunctive relief to compel compliance or pursuing any other administrative or civil remedies available to the FPPC under the Act. Operative on January 1, 2025. 

Use of Campaign Funds for Legal Defense: Criminal Convictions – (AB 2803 (Valencia) – Chapter 576, Statues of 2024.)

This bill prohibits campaign funds from being used to pay or reimburse expenditures for a fine, penalty, judgment, or settlement relating to a conviction for a felony described in Section 20 of the Elections Code, or for a felony involving fraud. If the candidate or elected officer uses campaign funds for other legal costs and expenses related to those criminal claims and is convicted, they must reimburse the campaign for all such funds used. This bill prohibits the use of campaign funds to reimburse expenditures for attorney’s fees and other costs in connection with criminal litigation if it results in a conviction for the above-noted felonies. Operative January 1, 2025.

Treatment of General Election Contributions – (SB 948 (Limon and Zbur) – Chapter 125, Statues of 2024.)

Existing law permits a candidate-controlled committee to receive contributions for a general election before the primary election; however, those funds may not be expended for the primary election. If the candidate is defeated in the primary election or withdraws from the general election, the candidate must return the funds received for the general election to the contributors. It was unclear how this law impacted a candidate who withdrew before the primary election or won the election in the primary. This bill provides, as a declaration of existing law, that a candidate who does not file a declaration of candidacy to qualify for a primary election is not considered to have withdrawn from the general election or to have been defeated in the primary election, and thereby would not be required to refund contributions raised for the general election. The bill instead allows those candidates to transfer funds raised for the general election to a committee established for the same or a different office, subject to the attribution rules. This bill further permits a candidate who wins in the primary election and does not advance to a general election to carry over funds raised for the primary election to a committee for any subsequent election to the same office without attribution. In the same scenario, a candidate who raises funds for the general election may transfer those funds to a committee for any subsequent election, subject to the attribution rules. Operative on January 1, 2025.

Redaction of Bank Account Information on Statements of Organization – (SB 1027 (Menjivar) – Chapter 180, Statues of 2024.)

Due to concerns about financial fraud, this bill requires the Secretary of State to redact the bank account number and, subject to a delayed operative date, the names of persons authorized to obtain bank account records from a committee’s Statement of Organization before providing the statement to the public. The bill authorizes a committee to omit that same information from the copy of the Statement of Organization filed with the local filing officer. Due to limitations within the existing Cal-Access campaign reporting system, additional fields cannot be redacted on Cal-Access and redaction of the names of persons authorized to obtain bank account records would take effect only after the Cal-Access Replacement System is operational. Operative, except as indicated, on January 1, 2025.