The Secretary of State’s office has assigned a ballot number to the only statewide measure in California’s June primary election.
Proposition 50 would allow either house of the state legislature to suspend members — with or without pay — by a two-thirds vote.
It comes in response to the cases of three state senators who faced legal troubles in 2014. Two of them were indicted facing various corruption charges. A third was convicted of perjury and voter fraud for lying about whether he lived inside his state Senate district or not.
The Senate voted to suspend the three Democratic lawmakers that year even though the California constitution only explicitly allows for the expulsion of a lawmaker. The constitution does not currently allow a lawmaker to be stripped of salary and benefits, so the Legislature placed Proposition 50 on the June 2016 ballot to ask voters for the power to suspend their members and dock paychecks.
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