Category: Investigative journalist
Lawmaker blows whistle on ‘Stop Nick Shirley Act’: A Democrat effort to halt ‘exposing fraud’ in California
Investigative journalist Nick Shirley, made famous after his viral Minnesota day care fraud video that exposed the “Quality Learing Center” and millions of dollars of alleged fraud, appears to have ruffled the feathers of Democrats in California.
A Republican lawmaker raised the alarm on a bill in California that would drastically clamp down on investigations like those conducted by Shirley.
‘The enemy truly is within.’
On Monday, Republican Assemblymember Carl DeMaio issued a press release warning about AB 2624, a bill he dubbed the “Stop Nick Shirley Act.”
“California Democrats are trying to intimidate citizen watchdog journalists and protect waste and fraud happening in far-left-wing NGOs. AB 2624 can only be described as the ‘Stop Nick Shirley Act’ — a bill designed to silence citizen journalists exposing fraud and abuse of taxpayer dollars,” DeMaio said in the press release.
Justin Sullivan/Getty Images
“AB 2624 would allow activists and taxpayer-funded organizations to demand the removal of video evidence — even if it captures misconduct in plain view — and threatens journalists with massive financial penalties,” DeMaio added. “That’s not about public safety — it’s about protecting powerful interests.”
AB 2624 was proposed by Democrat Assemblymember Mia Bonta earlier this year. Bonta’s husband, Rob Bonta, is the Democrat attorney general of California.
Attorney General Bonta has been targeting hospices and other facilities for possible fraud, overlapping with Shirley’s investigations in many respects. On Monday, Bonta wrote on social media that “in California, we’ve been cracking down on fraud for years.”
AB 2624 is framed as a privacy and anti-doxxing measure specifically for immigration service providers, their associates, and their clients. The bill is written with the following context in mind, directly calling out President Trump and his “anti-immigration” policies:
Persons working in the organizations that provide immigration support services have faced doxxing, courthouse targeting, online harassment, anti-immigrant vigilante threats, and coordinated campaigns and death threats. These acts have risen to alarming levels in 2025 and will continue due to the current federal administration’s anti-immigration attitude and policies.
The bill prohibits the posting of the “personal information or image” of a “designated immigration support services provider, employee, or volunteer, or other individuals residing at the same home address” “with the intent that another person imminently use that information to commit a crime involving violence or a threat of violence.”
Those found in violation of this section of the bill would face a fine of up to $10,000, one year of imprisonment, or both.
Additionally, if bodily injury were to come to anyone protected by the bill as a result of an investigation, the person responsible for the post would have committed a felony punishable by up to $50,000, imprisonment, or both.
The other key provision of the bill is more obscure:
A program participant may request that state and local agencies use the address designated by the Secretary of State as the participant’s address. When creating a public record, state and local agencies shall accept the address designated by the Secretary of State as a program participant’s substitute address.
In other words, the addresses of program participants and immigration service providers, which are presumably public, would be obscured with another address, thereby possibly blocking investigations into these programs.
Interested journalists and opponents of the bill view the potential obscuring of addresses and the steep punishments for disseminating information about these services, even without the intent to cause harm, as impediments to investigation and accountability.
Elon Musk weighed in on the news, and DeMaio reposted his comment: “California legislators are trying to make investigating fraud illegal.”
Nick Shirley, responding to DeMaio’s press release, said in part, “The enemy truly is within. When our politicians would rather protect fraudsters and illegal migrants, it’s time for us to stand up or face mass oppression from the traitors who ‘rule’ over us.”
Shirley added in a subsequent post that he was thinking of moving on to exposing fraud in another state, but the news of this bill changed his mind: “I’ve helped save America millions and billions of dollars by exposing fraud across the country. I was thinking about exposing another state but I think I will now go back to California[. N]ew exposé coming soon.”
Blaze News contacted California Governor Gavin Newsom (D) and Assemblymember Mia Bonta for comment but did not immediately receive a response.
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