(a) The Secretary of State is the chief elections officer of the state, and has the powers and duties specified in this code and § 12172.5 of the Government Code.

(b) (1) The Secretary of State shall make reasonable efforts to do all of the following:

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(A) Promote voter registration to eligible voters.

(B) Encourage eligible voters to vote.

(C) Promote preregistration to eligible citizens.

(D) Promote civic learning and engagement to prepare students and new citizens to register to vote and to vote.

(2) In undertaking these efforts, the Secretary of State shall prioritize communities that have been historically underrepresented in voter registration or voting.

(c) Beginning in the year before the federal decennial census and continuing through the completion of the enumeration activities for that census, the Secretary of State shall incorporate messages into public election materials produced by the Secretary of State that promote awareness of, and encourage participation in, the census. In undertaking this effort, the Secretary of State shall prioritize messages that are designed to overcome significant challenges to a complete and accurate enumeration of the state, including messages targeted at overcoming barriers to participation by historically hard-to-count communities based on response rate data from the United States Census Bureau.

(Amended by Stats. 2018, Ch. 652, Sec. 2. (AB 2592) Effective January 1, 2019.)