A California judge has permanently banned theKars4Kids jinglefrom state airwaves after a full civil trial found the charity's 30-year-old car-donation ad misled donors through deliberate omission.

Theruling, issued on 8 May 2026 by Judge Gassia Apkarian of the Orange County Superior Court, found that Kars4Kids violated California's False Advertising Law and Unfair Competition Law by broadcasting a jingle that said nothing about its actual mission.

Trial testimony showed that over 60% of the organisation's total funds flow to Oorah, a Jewish outreach nonprofit based in New Jersey that runs summer camps and adult programmes, including gap-year trips to Israel and matchmaking services. The case was brought by Bruce Puterbaugh, a cabinet maker in his 70s, who donated a car after hearing the jingle on the radio.

The jingle at the centre ofPuterbaugh v. Oorah, Inc.is four lines long: a phone number, the charity name spelled out, the phone number again, and the directive to 'donate your car today.' The court found that this brevity was not incidental.

Orange County Court says Kars4Kids can no longer run its jingle ads in California, after a lawsuit alleging that donations do not go to underprivileged CA kids but instead to funding trips to Israel for Orthodox Jewish 17/18yos in New York and New Jersey.pic.twitter.com/jJbjLQW3GT

IRS Form 990 documents admitted as trial exhibits showed the scale of what Oorah does with Kars4Kids revenue. Approximately £35.4m ($45m) is transferred annually to Oorah, according tocourt findings. A further 30% of total revenue is spent on in-house advertising and 6% on administrative costs, leaving virtually nothing directed at needy children in California.

In 2022 alone, Oorah allocated £344,000 ($437,000) to Middle East outreach and transferred £13m ($16.5m) to North Africa and the Middle East, a sum used to purchase a building in Israel. Landau confirmed in testimony that Oorah's programmes include matchmaking services for young adults and gap-year trips to Israel for 17- and 18-year-olds, averaging 250 participants annually. Oorah holds £157m ($199m) in set-aside assets, with £26.7m ($34m) in remaining liquid assets.

California accounts for 25% of Kars4Kids' national vehicle intake, roughly 30,000 of the 120,000 cars donated each year. Yet Kars4Kids runs no functional programme in the state. Its local presence amounts to a branded backpack giveaway of approximately 1,000 bags distributed to children regardless of financial need.Landau explicitly testifiedthat the organisation's primary purpose is not to help economically disadvantaged children.

Judge Apkarian concluded that the combination of child actors aged 8-10, the name 'Kars4Kids,' and the repetitive jingle collectively 'reinforce the belief that donations are used exclusively for the benefit of children.' The court held that the omission of the actual beneficiary class was a material deception. Kars4Kids has been ordered to pay Puterbaugh £197 ($250) in restitution and must cease all non-compliant broadcasting in California within 30 days.

The Orange County ruling is not the first time Kars4Kids has faced legal scrutiny over advertising. In 2009, Pennsylvania and Oregonfined the organisationfor deceptive practices, alleging that it obscured the fact that most raised funds supported Orthodox Jewish outreach rather than needy children. In 2017, the Minnesota attorney general stated she was 'concerned and troubled' by the organisation's practices after finding that only 1% of its California-state equivalent funding went to children in Minnesota.

Source: International Business Times UK