Bill Text: AZ SB1520 | 2020 | Fifty-fourth Legislature 2nd Regular | Introduced
Bill Title: Coordinated party expenditures; contributions
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Republican 1-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2020-02-04 - Senate read second time [SB1520 Detail]
Download: Arizona-2020-SB1520-Introduced.html
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REFERENCE TITLE: coordinated party expenditures; contributions |
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State of Arizona Senate Fifty-fourth Legislature Second Regular Session 2020
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SB 1520 |
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Introduced by Senator Ugenti-Rita
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AN ACT
amending sections 16-911 and 16-922, Arizona Revised Statutes; relating to campaign contributions and expenses.
(TEXT OF BILL BEGINS ON NEXT PAGE)
Be it enacted by the Legislature of the State of Arizona:
Section 1. Section 16-911, Arizona Revised Statutes, is amended to read:
16-911. Exemption from definition of contribution
A. A person may make any contribution not otherwise prohibited by law.
B. The following are not contributions:
1. The value of an individual's volunteer services or expenses that are provided without compensation or reimbursement, including the individual's:
(a) Travel expenses.
(b) Use of real or personal property.
(c) Cost of invitations, food or beverages.
(d) Use of e-mail email, internet activity or social media messages, only if the individual's use is not paid for by the individual or any other person and if the e-mails emails, social media messages or other internet activities do not contain or include transmittal of a paid advertisement or paid fund-raising solicitation.
2. The costs incurred for covering or carrying a news story, commentary or editorial by a broadcasting station or cable television operator, a video service provider, an internet website, a newspaper or another periodical publication, including an internet-based or electronic publication, if the cost for the news story, commentary or editorial is not paid for by and the medium is not owned or under the control of a candidate or committee.
3. Any payment to defray the expense of an elected official meeting with constituents or attending an informational tour, conference, seminar or presentation, if the payor or the elected official does not attempt to influence the result of an election and the payment is reported if required pursuant to title 38, chapter 3.1 or title 41, chapter 7, article 8.1, or both.
4. The payment by a political party to support its nominee, including:
(a) The printing or distribution of, or postage expenses for, voter guides, sample ballots, pins, bumper stickers, handbills, brochures, posters, yard signs and other similar materials distributed through the party.
(b) Coordinated party expenditures.
5. 4. The payment by any person to defray a political party's operating expenses or party-building activities, including:
(a) Party staff and personnel.
(b) Studies and reports.
(c) Voter registration, recruitment, polling and turnout efforts.
(d) Party conventions and party meetings.
(e) Construction, purchase or lease of party buildings or facilities.
6. 5. The value of any of the following to a committee:
(a) Interest earned on the committee's deposits or investments.
(b) Transfers between committees to reimburse expenses and distribute monies raised through a joint fund-raising effort, if the transfers comply with an agreement to reimburse and distribute monies that was executed before the joint fund-raising effort occurred.
(c) Payment of a committee's legal or accounting expenses by any person.
(d) An extension of credit for goods and services on a committee's behalf by a creditor if the terms are substantially similar to extensions of credit to nonpolitical debtors that are of similar risk and size of obligation. The creditor must make a commercially reasonable attempt to collect the debt, except that if an extension of credit remains unsatisfied by the committee after six months the committee is deemed to have received a contribution but the creditor is not deemed to have made a contribution.
7. 6. The value of nonpartisan communications that are intended to encourage voter registration and turnout efforts.
8. 7. Any payment to a filing officer for arguments in a publicity pamphlet.
9. 8. The payment by any sponsor or its affiliate for the costs of establishing, administering and soliciting contributions from its employees, members, executives, stockholders and retirees and their families to the sponsor's separate segregated fund.
10. 9. Any payment by any entity for the costs of communicating with its employees, members, executives, stockholders and retirees and their families about any subject, without regard to whether those communications are made in coordination with any candidate or candidate's agent.
11. 10. The value of allowing a candidate or a committee's representative to appear at any private residence or at the facilities of any entity to speak about the candidate's campaign or about a ballot measure, if the venue is furnished by the venue's owner, is not paid for by a third party and is not a sports stadium, coliseum, convention center, hotel ballroom, concert hall or other similar arena that is generally open to the public.
12. 11. The costs of hosting a debate or candidates' forum, if at least two opposing candidates, with respect to any given office sought, or representatives of at least two opposing ballot measure campaigns, with respect to any measure on the ballot, are invited with the same or similar advance notice and method of invitation.
13. 12. The preparation and distribution of voter guides, subject to the following:
(a) A featured candidate or ballot measure shall not receive greater prominence or substantially more space in the voter guide than any other candidate or ballot measure.
(b) The voter guide shall not include any message that constitutes express advocacy.
14. 13. Monies that are loaned by a financial institution in the ordinary course of business and not for the purpose of influencing the results of an election, except that the loan is deemed a pro rata contribution by any endorser or guarantor, other than the candidate's spouse.
15. 14. The costs of publishing a book or producing a documentary, if the publication and production are for distribution to the general public through traditional distribution mechanisms or a fee is obtained for the purchase of the publication or viewing of the documentary.
C. This section does not imply that any transactions that are not specifically listed in subsection B of this section are contributions unless those transactions otherwise meet the definition of contribution as defined in section 16‑901.
Sec. 2. Section 16-922, Arizona Revised Statutes, is amended to read:
16-922. Independent and coordinated expenditures
A. Any person may make independent expenditures.
B. An expenditure is not an independent expenditure if either of the following applies:
1. There is actual coordination with respect to an expenditure between a candidate or candidate's agent and the person making the expenditure or that person's agent.
2. Both of the following apply:
(a) The expenditure is based on nonpublic information about a candidate's or candidate committee's plans or needs that the candidate or candidate's agent provides to the person making the expenditure or that person's agent.
(b) The candidate or candidate's agent provides the nonpublic information with an intent toward having the expenditure made.
C. In evaluating whether an expenditure is an independent expenditure, a filing officer or enforcement officer may consider the following to be rebuttable evidence of coordination:
1. Any agent of the person making the expenditure is also an agent of the candidate whose election or whose opponent's defeat is being advocated by the expenditure.
2. In the same election cycle, the person making the expenditure or that person's agent is or has been authorized to raise or spend monies on the candidate's behalf.
3. In the same election cycle, the candidate is or has been authorized to raise money or solicit contributions on behalf of the person making the expenditure.
D. Notwithstanding subsection C of this section, coordination does not exist under either of the following:
1. If the person making the expenditure maintains a firewall between the person and that person's agent in compliance with all of the following:
(a) The person's agent did not participate in deciding to make the expenditure or in deciding the content, timing or targeting of the expenditure.
(b) The person making the expenditure has a written policy establishing the firewall and its requirements.
(c) The person making the expenditure and the person's agent followed the written policy regarding the firewall.
2. Solely because an agent of a person making the expenditure serves or has served on a candidate's host committee for a fund‑raising event.
E. An expenditure that is coordinated with a candidate, other than including a coordinated party expenditure, is deemed an in-kind contribution to the candidate.
F. An entity that makes an independent expenditure, other than an individual or a committee, shall file independent expenditure reports pursuant to section 16-926, subsection H.
