A bill to allow elected officials in Alabama to use their campaign contributions to pay for security measures and personnel for themselves and family members advanced to the Alabama Senate on Tuesday.
Another bill would allow for security for lawmakers at events outside of Montgomery.
The state’s Fair Campaign Practices Act currently allows candidates and elected officials to use their contributions for campaign-related expenses, “expenditures that are reasonably related to performing the duties of the office,” donations to the state’s General Fund and Education Trust Fund and donations to nonprofits.
Senate Bill 230 by Sen. Sam Givhan, R-Huntsville, would amend that law to allow for security related expenses, including security systems and monitoring devices and “reasonable costs of security personnel for a candidate, elected official, or immediate family or staff member of the candidate or elected official.”
The bill clarifies that the official can keep any equipment purchased once his or her term is over.
Also included are cybersecurity expenses such as data removal services that scrub personal information from websites.
“This bill came out of the Legislative Council because a lot of people have indicated concerns about safety,” Givhan told the committee on Tuesday.
The Legislative Council is the 20-member body of lawmakers that oversees the administration of the Legislature, including the construction of the new State House.
Separately, Givhan recently filed Senate Bill 231 to give House and Senate leadership the authority to hire security personnel at the new State House, expected to open later this year, and a nearby parking deck. It also allows for state-paid personnel at off-site events “as designated by the President Pro Tempore of the Senate and Speaker of the House of Representatives in coordination with the Alabama State Law Enforcement Agency, held in the State of Alabama away from the capitol complex.”
That bill will be in committee Wednesday.
Lawmakers here and in other states discussed increasing security last year following the killings of former Minnesota House Speaker Melissa Hortman and her husband, Mark, and the shootings of Minnesota Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette.
And prior to that, the Legislature put a $1.5 million line item in the 2026 General Fund budget for security around the capitol complex. That’s in addition to an existing $700,000 State House security line item in the Alabama Law Enforcement Agency’s allocations.