SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The California legislature’s age verification bill, one of numerous AV bills being sponsored around the country by anti-porn activists, will not be moving forward, Free Speech Coalition reported Tuesday.
The bill, an FSC statement explained, “is effectively dead after its potential price tag landed it in the Senate Appropriations Committee’s Suspense File.”
As XBIZ reported, AB 3080 passed unanimously in the state Assembly with bipartisan support in May, and was being considered by the state Senate.
The Free Speech Coalition, the group’s statement explained, “was active in its opposition to AB 3080, testifying against the bill in committee hearings, meeting with legislators, and rallying allies, industry members and fans to speak out against the bill.”
AB 3080 was introduced by Republican Assemblymember Juan Alanis, a former police officer from Modesto, and would require all adult websites to take “reasonable steps” to ensure that only adults can view them.
In June, following extensive discussions with Alanis and the introduction of several amendments addressing FSC’s key concerns about effectiveness and adults’ freedom to access adult content, FSC withdrew its formal opposition to the bill.
Privacy and civil liberties advocates — including Electronic Frontier Foundation, FIRE, ACLU and Woodhull Freedom Foundation — remained actively opposed, FSC reported.
FSC Executive Director Alison Boden said, “We thank Assemblymember Alanis for working so earnestly with us throughout the life of this bill. We completely agree with the need to keep minors from accessing age-inappropriate content without unintentionally blocking millions of adult consumers. We continue to believe this is possible and look forward to working with him and other members of the Assembly in future sessions.”
Bills placed in the Senate Appropriations “suspense file,” the FSC statement explained, are “held until the state budget has been prepared and are then considered in relation to available revenue. California’s on-going budget deficit makes bills placed in suspense unlikely to move forward, effectively killing them.”