While voting rights are under attack in other states across the country, Marc has led the fight to expand access to the ballot and make sure our voting systems are secure. Marc believes that our democracy is stronger when everyone participates, which is why he’s written over a dozen laws to make it easier to vote, to crack down on misinformation about the voting process, and to protect our elections from bad actors who want to undermine our democracy.

Marc is Defending our Democracy:

• Marc realized how dangerous it would be for Californians to have to vote in person in the middle of the COVID pandemic, so he wrote the landmark law for California to be a permanent vote-by-mail state. Now every active registered voter gets a ballot in the mail. Every election.

• Marc became chair of the Assembly Elections Committee in 2017, right after Russia interfered in our elections and Donald Trump became President. Marc convened elections security experts for a discussion, and as a result wrote the law for California to be the first state in the country to have its own Office of Elections Cybersecurity. This office works with all 58 counties to ensure they use best practices to keep voting systems secure, and it works with social media platforms to take down elections misinformation.

• Marc was one of the first elected officials in the country to realize the danger that deepfake technology could pose to our elections. In 2019 he wrote the first law in the country to crack down on the distribution of deepfakes with the intent to injure a candidate’s reputation or deceive a voter into voting for or against the candidate.

• The decisions elected officials make today will impact young people the most, but too many young people don’t vote. To make it easier for college students to participate in their democracy, Marc wrote a law to ensure that all California State University and University of California students would have access to a vote-by-mail ballot drop box on campus.

Millions of Californians struggle every day with the high cost of housing in the Bay Area and throughout the state. For teachers, nurses, and other middle-income Californians, this means super commutes to work, less time with their families, and limited ability to save. The impact is much more dire on the low-income workers our communities rely on to function, leading to a homelessness crisis among the working poor. We can’t continue kicking the can down the road. Marc has been a vocal advocate for the need to act responsibly and build more housing across California

Marc Delivers on Housing:

• Marc has secured funding to address specific housing needs in our communities. In the wake of the tragic shooting of eight farmworkers in Half Moon Bay in early 2023, it became clear that those who toil in the fields to put healthy food on our tables were living in horrendous conditions. Marc helped secure $7.5 million in state funds for farmworker housing projects that are underway on the coastside, and he is working with San Mateo County on efforts to build hundreds more units of farmworker housing.

• A report released in March 2019 found that 19 percent of California community college students who responded experienced homelessness in the previous year, 60 percent were housing insecure in the previous year, and 50 percent were food insecure in the prior 30 days. Marc took this as a call to action, and secured $40 million per year in ongoing funding to require California Community Colleges to provide a coordinated and integrated approach to address students’ basic needs, including homelessness, by creating a Basic Needs Center and hiring a basic needs coordinator at all 115 community college campuses across California.

• In 2022, Marc secured $8 million for an affordable housing project in East Palo Alto being developed by MidPen Housing and EPACANDO to help develop 136 affordable homes for low-income families on city-owned land.

• Marc has authored several bills to remove barriers to infill housing construction, safe parking, and affordable housing:

Establishing a narrow exemption from the California Environmental Quality Act for multi-family residential and mixed-use infill housing projects in unincorporated areas of California. This effort promotes housing projects within urbanized areas in our counties and helps address California’s housing crisis without adversely impacting the environment. (AB 1804 in 2018)

Requiring California Community Colleges to provide a coordinated and integrated approach to address students’ basic needs, including homelessness. This policy was implemented via the 2021 State Budget, in addition to $40 million per year in funding to support implementation. AB 2388 (2020)

In response to a request from local elected officials in his district, Marc introduced AB 2586 (2020) to eliminate barriers to providing 24-hour safe parking, thereby granting cities and counties another tool to urgently address the homelessness crisis in their communities. This bill was merged with AB 2533 (Ting and Berman) and signed into law.

AB 2006 (2022) - Streamlined the oversight of affordable housing currently done by multiple state entities by directing those entities to coordinate their compliance monitoring and eliminate duplicative work.

Every student deserves the opportunity to get a high-quality education and achieve their educational goals. Marc has been a leader in the legislature in ensuring that students get the skills they need to prepare them for the future, including integrating media literacy into K-12 education and expanding access to computer science education. He supported a school budget that will deliver the highest level of per pupil funding in state history and kept his campaign promise to deliver high-quality universal Pre-K for all 4-year-olds by 2025. In addition, Marc created and chairs the Select Committee on California’s 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education. The committee has held hearings across the state that have led to multiple new laws to support California’s 2 million community college students, many of whom are students of color and first-generation college students.

Marc Delivers on Stronger Schools:

• Today’s youth get much of their news from social media platforms like TikTok and X (formerly Twitter), where they are bombarded with misinformation, disinformation, and conspiracy theories. Marc wrote the law (AB 873 in 2023) to make sure that all K-12 schools integrate media literacy into science, history, math, and english classes so that students get the skills they need to be more critical consumers of online content, as well as become stronger digital citizens so that they are more conscientious about the information they put online and how they interact with others.

• 40% of high school students in California go to schools that don’t even offer computer science courses, starving their students - many of whom are students of color - of the skills they need to thrive in the 21st century. Marc believes this is inequitable and absolutely unacceptable. Marc led the effort to create a statewide Computer Science Coordinator in the Department of Education, and is now leading a broad coalition of education advocates to ensure that every high school student in California has access to computer science education by the 2027-28 school year.

• California’s community colleges provide a gateway for students, many of whom are students of color or first in their family to attend college, to move up the economic ladder and have a better life than their parents. But too many students struggle with unnecessary obstacles along their path to graduation and transferring to 4-year schools, leading to drop-out rates that are too high and transfer rates that are too low. Marc authored the Student Transfer Achievement Reform (STAR) Act of 2021 to expand access to the successful Associate Degree for Transfer that saves students time, money, and guarantees access to the CSU system, while also reducing bureaucratic barriers that stifle student success.

• Marc has focused his efforts on helping underprivileged community college, CSU, and UC students, including authoring: AB 2881 (2022) to grant priority registration for student parents and establish a student parent webpage for each campus; and AB 789 (2023) to remove barriers that limit students’ ability to keep their financial aid.

• In recognition of Marc’s leadership in education policy, he has received the following awards from higher education organizations: Legislator of the Year from the UC Student Association (2021,) Legislator of the Year from the Cal State Student Association (2022,) Legislator of the Year from the Western Association for College Admission Counseling (2021,) and Distinction for Transforming Transfer from the Campaign for College Opportunity (2021).

Access to safe and legal abortion is a fundamental right for every Californian. In the State Assembly, Marc is fighting back against attacks on women’s rights by MAGA politicians and extremist judges. He supported the law to maintain the privacy of patients’ medical records and ensure that pregnancy loss is not criminalized, as well as expanding birth control access and training for medical professionals who provide abortions. Marc will always protect access to birth control, abortion, and the full range of reproductive healthcare.

Marc Delivers on Protecting Reproductive Rights:

• Marc is the only candidate endorsed by Planned Parenthood, from which he has a 100% voting record. He has also been recognized as a Reproductive Freedom Champion by Reproductive Freedom for All (formerly NARAL California).

• Marc was principal co-author of the effort to amend the California Constitution to prohibit the state from interfering with or denying an individual’s reproductive freedom, including the right to abortion and the right to choose or refuse contraceptives. This was approved by voters in November 2022 as Proposition 1.

• In response to the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade, Marc co-authored numerous new laws to further protect choice, including:

AB 1666 (2022) – protects patients and providers from civil liability based on laws in other states that are hostile to abortion rights.

AB 2091 (2022) – enhances privacy protections for medical records related to abortion care against disclosures to law enforcement and out-of-state third parties seeking to enforce hostile abortion bans in other states.

AB 2223 (2022) – protects people from prosecutions and criminalization of abortion or pregnancy loss.

SB 487 (2023) – prohibits health plans and health insurers from terminating, discriminating against, or otherwise penalizing a provider based on a civil judgment, criminal conviction, or another disciplinary action in another state solely because they are providing reproductive health care services prohibited or restricted in that other state.

From increased wildfires and flooding to extreme drought and other weather events, the climate crisis is threatening the lives and livelihoods of Californians across the state. Protecting the environment is not only important for the long-term health of our planet, but for our personal health and welfare. Access to parks and open space are vital for healthy communities. Marc has led efforts to address climate threats, reduce greenhouse gas emissions, support clean energy and green jobs, and ensure access to open space.

Marc Delivers on Climate Protection:

• Marc wrote AB 1346 (2021), the landmark law to ban the sale of new gas-powered small off-road engines, such as leaf blowers, lawnmowers, and other heavily polluting landscaping equipment. This equipment, which recently surpassed passenger cars in emissions of smog-forming pollutants, is bad for the climate, terrible for the health of landscaping professionals, and causes immense noise pollution in our neighborhoods. Marc also obtained $30 million in the budget to assist small landscaping businesses with the transition to zero-emission equipment in advance of the law taking effect in 2024.

• Marc authored AB 1219 (2021) to reestablish the Natural Heritage Preservation Tax Credit program, which allows the state, a local government, or a qualified non-profit to acquire conservation, park, or habitat land at a discounted purchase price by structuring the acquisition so that the landowner can receive a state tax credit.

• In order to accelerate the protection of natural lands and open space, Marc authored AB 782 (2019) to provide a limited CEQA exemption for the acquisition of land by a public agency in order to preserve open space, habitat, or historical resources.

• In addition, Marc has secured significant budget funding to support open space preservation, outdoor recreation, and flood protection in our communities, including:

$8 million for the acquisition of the 6,000-acre Cloverdale Ranch in San Mateo County by the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District. The San Francisco Chronicle referred to this acquisition as “one of the greatest conservation stories on the San Mateo County coast.”

$5 million to support public, safe, responsible, and managed access to Tunitas Creek Beach just south of Half Moon Bay.

$4.75 million to renovate Carter Park in Half Moon Bay to better serve the community as well as visitors to the coastside.

$4 million to support the Butano Channel Restoration and Resiliency Project in Pescadero to reduce flooding risk in coastal San Mateo County.

$2 million to assist the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District in acquiring the 540-acre Gordon Ridge property in coastal San Mateo.

Whether you’re in school, at work, or at your place of worship, every Californian deserves to be safe from gun violence. Tragically, mass shootings continue to devastate our communities, including in Half Moon Bay this past January when a gunman shot and killed seven farmworkers at their places of work. California has some of the smartest and toughest gun safety laws in the country, and they are saving lives, but Marc believes we must do more to address the epidemic of gun violence in our communities.

Marc Delivers on Addressing Gun Violence:

• In 2019, Marc partnered with the experts at the University of California Firearm Violence Research Center to write a bill that tasks them with developing and implementing firearm-violence prevention education and training programs for health care providers. In addition, Marc secured X million in the budget to fund the effort.

• Many people buy guns because they think that will keep them safer, but the reality is that keeping a gun in the home dramatically increases the chances that someone who lives in the home will be a victim of gun violence. Marc wrote a law to ensure that before anyone buys a gun, they are made aware of those risks and of how to store a gun safely in the house.

• Too many gun stores aren’t following California’s laws governing the sale, transfer, and storage of firearms. Marc teamed up with California Attorney General Rob Bonta to expand the Department of Justice’s authority to enforce our tough laws and hold gun stores accountable.

• Marc co-authored Assembly Bill 28, which strengthened California’s gun safety laws. The law places a fee on firearms and ammunition sold by gun manufacturers and dealers, which generates funding for school safety and violence prevention programs, including initiatives to stop school shootings.

At a time when many Californians are struggling to make ends meet, they can’t afford to be ripped off by greedy companies.

Marc Protects Consumers:

• Too many companies make it easy to sign up for their services, but then make it practically impossible to cancel your subscription when you decide you don’t need it anymore. Marc authored AB 390 (2021), which ensures that consumers who sign up for a subscription online can cancel it online and that they can do so without delay or having to jump through needless hoops.

• In his 2023 State of the Union address, President Biden called out ‘junk fees’ like resort, cleaning, and destination fees that hotels tack on at the very last minute before you reserve a room. Marc introduced AB 537 (2023), which ensures that the advertised cost of your hotel stay is the real price you pay, creating more transparency for consumers on how much the lodging will cost.

• Marc led efforts to strengthen consumer warranty protections for Californians by requiring that warranties start on the date of delivery rather than the date of purchase (AB 2912 in 2022), ensuring that consumers receive the full benefit and duration of their warranty. Prior to this law, many product warranties started on the date of purchase, even if backlogs and delayed deliveries meant it took months for the appliance to actually be delivered, wasting valuable time off of the warranty.