California state law requires legislators to pass budgets by June 15 that contain >$100 billion of spending on enterprises that make political donations to legislators who approve that spending. But state law allows political donations to be kept secret until June 30 and the reports filed on that date aren’t made public until July 31. Shouldn’t political donations be made public before legislators finish their work?
The good news is that donors may voluntarily disclose donations at any time. We are certainly happy to do so. So far this year, Govern For California Courage Committee has made donations to Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh, Dave Cortese, Megan Dahle, Tim Grayson, Sydney Kamlager, Alex Lee, Janet Nguyen, Kevin McCarty, Blanca Rubio, Susan Rubio, Reggie Jones-Sawyer, Tom Umberg and Shirley Weber.
It would be nice if there was no money in CA politics. Until that is the case, legislators should reject donations from enterprises that do business with the state and donations should be voluntarily disclosed with greater frequency than current law requires.
