Commenting on the vote in the European Parliament on the proposal for a regulation on transparency and targeting of political advertising, FDP MEP Svenja Hahn said:
"Stricter transparency rules for political advertising are supposed to help against manipulation of democratic elections, I share the goal. However, the parliamentary text clearly goes too far and would, in this form, harm the communication of political parties with voters and thus the democratic process itself. That is why I abstained from the vote today."
In this regard, Hahn is particularly critical of Article 12of the parliamentary text on targeted political advertising, which was the exclusive competence of the LIBE-Committee:
"Targeting of potential voters is already carried out by democratic parties with full respect for data protection - whether on social media or as banners on other websites. It is an important part of the democratic opinion-forming process. Almost completely restricting or even de facto banning targeted advertising would be detrimental to the democratic process. One ray of hope, however, is that we have at least been able to achieve exceptions to the restrictive rules, such as for door-to-door campaigning or political newsletters.”