During Saturday’s primary election, Louisiana voters passed Amendment No. 1, which prohibits private and foreign donations to conduct elections, with a more than 70-percent majority. The effort to get Amendment No. 1 on the primary ballot was led by State Senator-Elect Blake Miguez with the passage of HB 311 in June. Representative Beau Beaullieu and State Senator Sharon Hewitt were also instrumental in its passage.
Specifically, Amendment No. 1 prohibits the use of funds, goods, or services from a foreign government or private source to conduct elections unless authorized by law.
This amendment is in response to the 2020 election, during which states saw an influx of cash from Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg through the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL). Under the guise of providing “COVID-19 relief grants,” CTCL funneled more than $400 million into more than 2,500 jurisdictions—most of which were “swing” areas or left-leaning counties. Much of the funding was spent on get-out-the-vote efforts, including voter advertising, promotional videos, and registering teenagers to vote—which have nothing to do with COVID-19 and everything to do with influencing elections.
“Many of Louisiana’s neighboring states were targets of CTCL’s ‘Zuckerbucks’ scheme, and the state was wise to prevent the same influence from coming into their own backyard, first when Attorney General Jeff Landry stopped it in 2020 and now with this constitutional amendment,” said Allen Cambon, state government affairs director at the Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA). “Billionaires like Mark Zuckerberg shouldn’t be able to tip the scales by going around the legislature to fund one of our most basic functions of government. Louisiana voters spoke loud and clear: Louisiana elections are not for sale.”
