On May 25, the California Senate Appropriations Committee passed SB 149 by 5-2. It bars candidates from the presidential primary unless they submit copies of their income tax returns for the last five years. The bill even applies to write-in candidates in a presidential primary. But it does not apply to independent presidential candidates. Here is the text of the bill.
Next in order to be on the ballot, candidates will need to submit naked photos of themselves. I mean if we’re invading their privacy might as well go all the way.
I think the bill violates the California Constitution, which appears to give presidential candidates who are prominently mentioned in media a right to be on the presidential primary ballot. They don’t even need to file a declaration of candidacy. So the legislature can’t impose conditions on them, in my opinion.
US Constitution says age 35, natural born citizen, resident – nothing about tax returns.
California should make Presidential Elector a Voter-Nominated Office, with one elector chosen from each congressional district, and one elector chosen from pairs of SBOE districts. The provisions for a presidential preference primary should be eliminated from the state constitution.
The California Constitution should also provide for legal equality for all political parties with 100 or more registrants, and deregulate all internal activities of political parties.
I strongly agree with Gene here on qualifications.
This proposed law presupposes that every future presidential primary candidate will have been required (due to having sufficiently high enough income) to file a tax return with the Internal Revenue Service for the stated years. It is quite possible a person who owns/controls US$millions in assets structuring that ownership to minimize their income so that person is or nearly so a pauper [for income tax purposes]. Which could bring in a whole different set of issues during a campaign. So while I agree with Richard’s view on this issue that it is un-Constitutional, I believe it’s likely that this bill (possibly amended further) will be signed this year or in 2018 by Governor Brown.