Major issues to watch in the 2026 Oregon legislative session
Oregon lawmakers will convene beginning on Feb. 2 in a short legislative session. Here are the major issues they will focus on.
Legislators passed a bill March 5 to modify forthcoming changes to Oregon’s campaign finance system despite outcry from good government groups who say the bill creates new loopholes.
Those groups were key in creating House Bill 4024, which was created and passed in 2024 in place of warring ballot measures seeking to overhaul the system.
That legislation included new limits on contributions, including capping individual spending on statewide candidates each cycle at $3,300, and other changes. Parts of the bill were set to go into effect in 2027 and 2028.
Under the new proposal, House Bill 4018, the limits would still begin in 2027, but disclosure requirements and penalties would be pushed to 2031. It also gives the Secretary of State money to update the campaign finance system, but far less than the office previously thought it might need.
Representatives voted 39-19 to pass the bill. A few hours later, the Senate passed it 20-9.
Fourteen of the “no” votes in the House were Democrats, including Reps. Tom Andersen, D-Salem, and Lesly Muñoz, D-Woodburn.
Muñoz told the Statesman Journal she voted against the bill after hearing from people upset with the bill’s process.
Six Democratic senators cast a “no” vote on HB 4018.
Oregon campaign finance reform advocates say they were left out of negotiations
After working together in 2024, advocates said Speaker of the House Julie Fahey, D-Eugene, “ghosted” them.
Good government groups said the bill does far more than address necessary technical fixes to HB 4024.
HB 4018 is “a complete betrayal of the deal that was made two years ago,” Norman Turrill of Oregon’s League of Women Voters said.
Should the bill be signed by Gov. Tina Kotek, the groups said they will push their own changes through a 2028 ballot initiative.
Those advocates have outlined at least 11 different changes they believe the bill creates. The bill’s contents were first shared through a Feb. 9 amendment that was posted after 5 p.m., hours before it received a public hearing in an 8 a.m. work session on Feb. 10 and later, Feb. 12.
Secretary of State Tobias Read told legislators in January his office was requesting $25 million as a placeholder to fund a new campaign finance system for the state. Read was not secretary of state when House Bill 2024 was passed and his office is now working to implement the bill’s changes on a fast approaching deadline.
An additional amendment to the bill instead gives the Secretary of State’s Office $1.5 million for staff, some of whom would be tasked with updating the state’s current system.
House members agreed March 4 to send the bill back to committee, presumably to be amended. A 5 p.m. committee meeting was canceled about an hour after initially being announced.
A work session on HB 4018 was moved to the next morning. After an hour of delay, legislators convened and finished the meeting, moving the bill back to the floor without any changes, in less than three minutes.
A new campaign finance bill, Senate Bill 1502, was introduced and scheduled for a public hearing and work session March 4.
The bill is “very simple,” Senate Minority Leader Bruce Starr, R-Dundee, said. It tells the Secretary of State’s Office to draft a bill for the 2027 session with necessary campaign finance improvements from HB 4024 and HB 4018.
Three senators voted against the bill March 5. It now moves to the House. Legislators have a March 8 deadline to end the session.
“SB 1502 would not correct the severe damage to campaign finance reform that will occur, if HB 4018 B is enacted in this session,” Dan Meek of Honest Elections Oregon wrote in submitted testimony.
Lawmakers appear unsatisfied, but supportive, toward Oregon campaign finance bill
House Majority Leader Ben Bowman, D-Tigard, said HB 4018 made positive changes but acknowledged it was “a challenging vote for many of us.”
“We are implementing this whole new system that is new for all of us, and there are a lot of opinions and there are a lot of details to figure out,” House Minority Leader Lucetta Elmer, R-McMinnville, said. Elmer and Bowman carried the bill in the House. “With that being said, we’re moving forward in good faith, knowing that we’ll also be coming back next year to make sure that those details and all those kinks are worked out.”
Rep. Mark Gamba, D-Milwaukie, said he was concerned about the bill and the “non-inclusive process” that led to it.
Gamba pointed to a letter from the Washington, D.C.-based Campaign Legal Center that states in part that the bill “would substantially revise critical campaign finance reforms enacted two years ago in Oregon” and weaken the state’s campaign finance law.
The current bill is not the only possibility for moving forward, Sen. Jeff Golden, D-Ashland, told lawmakers. Proposed amendments that would have extended implementation timelines without the additional changes were ignored, he said.
“House Bill 4024 and this bill, 4018, have two things in common. One, they were thrown together in a few days behind closed doors, mostly by organizations who dominate campaign funding in the current system,” Golden said. “And two, very few legislators understand what is actually in these bills.”
He urged lawmakers to abandon the system created in House Bill 4024 as an “uncomfortably expensive learning experience” and develop a new plan based on successful programs in other states.
Sen. Sara Gelser Blouin, D-Corvallis, also spoke against the bill on the Senate floor.
“The concern that I had and that my constituents had was technical changes are one thing, but it should not be increasing the amount of money that candidates can take in or hold or carry over,” Gelser Blouin said. “Unfortunately, as it’s drafted, this bill does all of those things.”
HB 4024 is too complicated and “unimplementable” without the fixes in HB 4018, Starr said.
Sen. Lew Frederick, D-Portland, agreed, saying HB 4018 and SB 1502 give reassurance about a system he has concerns about.
“If there were no cameras and the lights were off, I think most people would agree this is not the bill we want,” Rep. Paul Evans, D-Monmouth, said.
Some lawmakers expressed similar feelings of discontentment with the bill in Ways and Means and one of its subcommittees on March 3, but said they felt it was important to make some progress on the issue. Discussions could happen again in 2027, they said.
Rep. Nancy Nathanson, D-Eugene, who ultimately voted in favor of the bill, said March 3 supporting it “is a very painful choice to make.”
Statesman Journal reporter Dianne Lugo contributed to this report.
Anastasia Mason covers state government for the Statesman Journal. Reach her at acmason@statesmanjournal.com or 971-208-5615.
