California Senate Bill 27 (2019)
California Senate Bill 27 (SB 27), alternatively known as the Presidential Tax Transparency and Accountability Act, is a California law that requires candidates running for either President of the United States or Governor of California to publicly release their tax return of the previous five years in order to be listed on the primary ballot. The law does not place the requirement to publicly release tax returns on candidates running as write-in candidates.
| California Senate Bill 27 (2019) | |
|---|---|
| California State Legislature | |
| Full name | An act to add Chapter 7 (commencing with Section 6880) to Part 1 of Division 6 of, and to add Part 5 (commencing with Section 8900) to Division 8 of, the Elections Code, relating to elections, and declaring the urgency thereof, to take effect immediately. |
| Introduced | December 3, 2018 |
| Assembly voted | 57-17 |
| Senate voted | 29-10 |
| Signed into law | July 30, 2019 |
| Sponsor(s) | Mike McGuire and Scott Wiener |
| Governor | Gavin Newsom |
| Code | Elections |
| Website | leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/.. |
Status: Partially struck down | |
The law's requirements for presidential candidates were invalidated by the courts. The law was first applied in the 2021 gubernatorial recall election, but a judge ruled that application invalid, halting the secretary of state's application of the law to the recall election. The 2022 gubernatorial election is therefore the first election for which the law is expected to be fully applicable.