Statement of Honest Elections Oregon:
Supporters of real campaign finance reform in Oregon are outraged by the action of Secretary of State Shemia Fagan today to disqualify all serious campaign finance reform initiative petitions. Any of them would:
- establish political campaign contribution limits
- require that political advertisements name their largest funders
- require faster and more complete public disclosure of campaign spending, including "dark money"
There is no valid legal basis for refusing to allow the gathering of signatures on these initiatives (Petitions 43, 44, and 45). All of them satisfy all criteria in the Oregon Constitution and laws. The Honest Elections Oregon coalition will on Friday ask the Oregon Supreme Court in a mandamus action to require Secretary Fagan to allow the initiatives to obtain voter signatures. A total of 112,020 verified registered voter signatures must be submitted by July 8.
Contrary to the Secretary's suggestion that the campaign finance reform advocates "start over" after correcting what she claims is a technical error (15 words in petitions that range from 11,000 to 16,000 words), the ballot title process has built-in delays for government actions that consume at least 4 months. Starting over now would mean not being about to start collecting the 112,020 required signatures until early June--leaving only about one month, which is not enough.
Unless the Oregon Supreme Court issues such an order promptly, the window for gathering enough signatures will have closed, and Secretary Fagan's decision will preclude all statewide campaign finance reform initiatives until November 2024.
