Governor Newsom Is Right: AB 1349 Needs More Work
This week, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed AB 1349, a new ticketing law that bans most speculative ticket sales and restricts deceptive ticket websites and advertising. We’ve long supported efforts to stop the sale of “ghost tickets” that sellers don’t actually have, and this law is an important step forward. But for artists and concert fans, important gaps remain.
Ghost ticketing is a simple problem: someone should not be able to sell a ticket they don’t own and may never be able to deliver. Fans can end up paying inflated prices for tickets that don’t exist, with little recourse when something goes wrong.
AB 1349 takes aim at that practice, but its protections for live music are incomplete. Governor Newsom acknowledged concerns with the final bill in his signing message, writing that it “appears to take an uneven approach, allowing select ticket sellers to avoid certain obligations under the bill,” and that the carve-out “deserves further discussion.”
Governor Newsom is right. California should finish the job by closing the remaining gaps and ensuring artists and concert fans are fully protected from ghost tickets and other deceptive ticketing practices.
In the meantime, enforcement matters. The protections AB 1349 does provide will only be as effective as their enforcement. That means holding sellers accountable for offering tickets they don’t have and taking action against deceptive websites and advertising that mislead fans.
We urge the California Department of Justice to vigorously enforce AB 1349 so its new protections have real impact. And we support Governor Newsom’s call to revisit the law and strengthen protections for artists and concert fans in the year ahead.
Statement attributable to Live Nation Entertainment:
“AB 1349 is a small step toward protecting concert fans from speculative ‘ghost tickets,’ but significant gaps remain. Vigorous enforcement by the California Department of Justice will be critical to making these protections meaningful for fans. We share Governor Newsom’s concern that the law takes an uneven approach and support closing the remaining loopholes to better protect artists and concert fans.”