What to Expect in 2021

(Interested in the 2020 Session Recap? Click Here)

New Issues This Year

Public financing of campaigns
Because of the high expense of campaigns, running for office is often not possible for someone who does not have significant personal wealth or access to those who do. The burden of raising funds is time consuming for candidates and incumbents making it difficult to not accept special interest group donations. Several other states, and the city of Seattle provide public funds to candidates who have demonstrated sufficient public support.  A bill  to provide public funding for supreme court campaigns was introduced in a past session and we are working to have it introduced again.

Review of disclosure requirements to align with date ballots are mailed
With vote by mail, we now have an election period, instead of an Election Day.  To ensure voters are aware of campaign donations and expenditures when they are ready to vote, and to close reporting loopholes, we need to consider changing due dates for reporting.

Increased digital political advertising transparency
Digital advertising has grown exponentially in dollars spent and in complexity of sources of funds. While this advertising is covered under the state’s campaign finance disclosure laws, access to information is fragmented and hard to find and piece together. The Public Disclosure Commission is working with other states to learn and develop best practices for improved reporting that can be consistently applied and transparent for both the regulated community and makes it easier for the public to understand who is behind the digital ads. Another goal is to empower small campaigns to use this low-cost method of advertising.  Proposals include using a unique identifier to register digital political ads to make it easy to track like the postal code mailers.

Source:  PDC FY20 annual report