Gov. Code, § 84504.1 · Article 5. Disclosure in Advertisements
Gov. Code, § 84504.1
Text — As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
(a) An advertisement paid for by a committee, other than a political party committee or a candidate controlled committee established for an elective office of the controlling candidate, that is disseminated as a video, including advertisements on television and videos disseminated over the Internet, shall include the disclosures required by Sections 84502, 84503, and 84514 at the beginning or end of the advertisement.
(b) The disclosure required by subdivision (a) shall be written and displayed for at least five seconds of a broadcast of 30 seconds or less or for at least 10 seconds of a broadcast that lasts longer than 30 seconds.
(1) The written disclosure required by subdivision (a) shall appear on a solid black background on the entire bottom one-third of the television or video display screen, or bottom one-fourth of the screen if the committee does not have or is otherwise not required to list top contributors, and shall be in a contrasting color in standard Arial Regular type, and the type size for capital letters in the written disclosure shall be 4 percent of the height or width of the television or video display advertisement, whichever is less.
(2) The disclosure required by Section 84514, if any, shall be white and appear at the top of the disclosure area, and shall be separated from the disclosures required by Sections 84502 and 84503 by a blank horizontal space at least 2 percent of the height of the television or video display screen.
(3) The disclosures required by Section 84502 shall be white and shall follow the disclosure required by Section 84514. The disclosures required by Section 84503, if any, shall be yellow, such as HTML hex value #FFFF00, and shall be separated from the disclosures required by Section 84502 by a blank horizontal space at least 2 percent of the height of the television or video display screen. The top contributors, if any, shall each be disclosed on a separate horizontal line separate from any other text, in descending order, beginning with the top contributor who made the largest cumulative contributions on the first line. All disclosure text shall be centered horizontally in the disclosure area. If there are any top contributors, the written disclosures shall be underlined in a manner clearly visible to the average viewer, except for the names of the top contributors, if any.
(4) The names of the top contributors shall not have their type condensed or have the spacing between characters reduced to be narrower than a normal non-condensed standard Arial Regular type.
(5) If the name of one or more top contributor exceeds the width of the screen and is required to wrap onto a second line, then the names of contributors shall be clearly marked, using a highly visible symbol or minimum vertical separation defined by the Commission, to indicate where one top contributor name ends and the next begins.
(c) An advertisement that is an independent expenditure supporting or opposing a candidate shall include the appropriate statement from Section 84506.5 printed immediately above the background with sufficient contrast that is easily readable by the average viewer.
(d) Any text or image not required in this section shall not appear in the disclosure area, except as provided in Section 84504.8 and as otherwise authorized or required by applicable law.
Notes and commentary — not statutory text
History
Amended by Stats. 2024, Ch. 260, Sec. 2. (AB 2355) Effective January 1, 2025.
Source of truth
- Edition
- As published in the Legislative Counsel's database, tables dated October 18, 2026 (pubinfo_2025.zip)
- Official file
- https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=GOV§ionNum=84504.1.
- Text hash
- sha256 bdad15589395778cbfacb5a9cb7f40306565d5aeba1f0eb51a98a41c818c9c94
- Composed by
- compose_ca.py 2026-10-22: the Legislative Counsel's CAML content files read by a tokenizer (caml_readers.reader_a); an independent xml.etree reading (caml_readers.reader_b) agrees on every section
This section cites
Provisions in this library that the text above cites, as it prints each citation. A range cited as “ss. 61.13-61.16” links its first and last provisions.
Government Code
- Gov. Code, § 84502Printed as Section 84502 | Sections 84502 and 84503 | Sections 84502, 84503, and 84514
- Gov. Code, § 84503Printed as Section 84503 | Sections 84502 and 84503 | Sections 84502, 84503, and 84514
- Gov. Code, § 84504.8Printed as Section 84504.8
- Gov. Code, § 84506.5Printed as Section 84506.5
- Gov. Code, § 84514Printed as Section 84514 | Sections 84502, 84503, and 84514
Cited by 4 provisions
Provisions in this library whose text cites Gov. Code, § 84504.1. Each shows the citation as that text prints it.
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