Voters at Honolulu Hale line up to vote in the 2024 General Election. A new Hawaii law, signed by Gov. Josh Green last week, would restrict corporations, organizations and other “artificial persons” from spending money or contributing “anything of value to influence elections or ballot measures.”
Gov. Josh Green has signed into law a measure that aims to restrict campaign spending activity by corporations and other so-called artificial persons, in a legislative victory for the anti-Trump administration group Indivisible Hawaii, which championed the bill.
Senate Bill 2471 “limits the powers that the state grants to corporations, limited liability companies, partnerships, associations, and other artificial persons,” according to the legislation. Those powers do not include spending money or contributing “anything of value to influence elections or ballot measures,” the legislation states.
The new law attempts to bypass the effects of the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2010 ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission, which has paved the way for corporations and other outside groups, including labor unions, to spend unprecedented amounts of money on U.S. elections.
Green signed SB 2471 into law on May 14 as Act 011. In announcing the new law, Green’s office said it “restricts certain political spending activities by corporations and other ‘artificial persons’ under Hawaii law by redefining and limiting the powers granted to those entities. Political action committees will remain governed by existing campaign finance laws within the state, but they will not be able to spend any money received from corporations as a result of this Act.
“This bill is intended to strengthen transparency, reduce the influence of corporate money in elections and help restore public trust in Hawaii’s democratic process,” the announcement said.
Some lawmakers credited Indivisible Hawaii’s advocacy for helping get the bill passed and signed into law. The group has grown to nine chapters statewide and has organized several large rallies in the islands since President Donald Trump returned to power in 2025.
Indivisible members “were pushing this bill pretty heavily,” said state Rep. Scot Matayoshi (D, Kaneohe- Maunawili), who served on the joint Senate-House conference committee that kept the measure alive at the last minute despite concerns from nonprofits, unions and others.
“Indivisible is very good at mobilizing people to make calls and send emails to legislators to bring an issue to the forefront,” Matayoshi said. “So, I think that’s their big strength.”
Indivisible’s outreach to legislators in support of SB 2471, Matayoshi said, “made it easier because everyone was aware of it and knew that there was public pressure to have this bill heard and pass. But it made it harder because when this bill was first introduced it had a lot of pretty major problems that could have hurt local unions and nonprofits.”