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California Judge Routes Campaign Robocalls Through Colorado

Posted by timothy on from the parsing-the-point-finely dept.

Thomas Hawk writes "Victoria Kolakowski, a current sitting law judge at the California PUC, is running for Alameda Superior Court judge in California. As part of her campaign she is robodialing people in California with a pre-recorded message. The only problem is that in Califorina robodials are actually illegal unless first introduced by a non-recorded natural person who gains consent to play the call. Ironically, the agency set up to protect our privacy and enforce this law, the California PUC, is the very agency where Kolakowski works today. Kolakowski originally apologized for the calls but then later deleted messages on her Facebook account from people objecting to her use of these calls. Now Kolakowski is trying to argue that because 'technically' she is routing her calls through Colorado from outside the state that her robodials are actually legal."

6 of 191 comments (clear)

  1. I'm in California by MyFirstNameIsPaul · · Score: 4, Informative

    For the last week or two I've frequently received three robocalls a day. I'd say this law's effectiveness is on par with the hands-free laws.

    --

    I once took an excursion to Reddit, and later HN. Unlimited up/down voting sucks when dealing with a hive-mind.

  2. Re:go figure. by BattleApple · · Score: 5, Informative

    The use of such a device by any person, either individually or acting as an officer, agent, or employee of a person or corporation operating automatic dialing-announcing devices, is subject to this article.

    http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/cgi-bin/waisgate?WAISdocID=85394713794+1+0+0&WAISaction=retrieve

    2872(d) lists exemptions.. I don't see anything regarding political messages

  3. Re:go figure. by green1 · · Score: 2, Informative

    Politician thinks the rules only apply to other people. News at 11.

    Where I live, they're right. All telemarketing and Robo-calling laws in Canada have specific exceptions for political campaigns...

    Of course as soon as I get one from a candidate I immediately remove them from my list of parties to vote for in that election...

  4. Not the only one == Meg Whitman also doing this. by whoever57 · · Score: 4, Informative

    I just got a robocall that was not compliant with the law (incoming caller-id blocked, no human intro, no phone number given) "by" Mitt Romney on behalf of Meg Whitman.

    --
    The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
  5. Re:Let the Kolakowski campaign know how you feel by michaelhood · · Score: 2, Informative

    I'll just leave this here: http://public.ifbyphone.com/services/voice-broadcasting

  6. Re:go figure. by Imrik · · Score: 2, Informative

    Just make sure the call is from the candidate they're advocating and not their opponent. I don't know about Canadian law but US political campaign calls are required to state who sponsored it. Unfortunately that notice is at the very end meaning you have to listen to the whole thing.