Sens Klobuchar, Graham, and Warner Reintroduce Honest Ads Act

Sens Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and Mark Warner (D-VA) reintroduced the Honest Ads Act to help prevent foreign interference in future elections and improve the transparency of online political advertisements. Sen Graham carries on the bipartisan legacy of the bill from the late Sen John McCain (R-AZ).  The Honest Ads Act ensures that political ads sold online are covered by the same rules as ads sold on TV, radio, and satellite. The Act:

• Amends the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002’s definition of electioneering communication to include paid Internet and digital advertisements.
• Requires digital platforms with at least 50,000,000 monthly viewers to maintain a public file of all electioneering communications purchased by a person or group who spends more than $500.00 total on ads published on their platform. The file would contain a digital copy of the advertisement, a description of the audience the advertisement targets, the number of views generated, the dates and times of publication, the rates charged, and the contact information of the purchaser.
• Requires online platforms to make all reasonable efforts to ensure that foreign individuals and entities are not purchasing political advertisements in order to influence the American electorate.

Companion legislation is led in the House by Reps Derek Kilmer (D-WA) and Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and has 26 Democratic and Republican cosponsors.