I 

113TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. R. 5884 

To prohibit the replacement of the gasoline excise tax with a GPS, location 

or distance-based tax and for other purposes. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

DECEMBER 11, 2014 

Mr. STOCKMAN introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, and in addition to the Committees on 

Ways and Means and Transportation and Infrastructure, for a period to 

be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee 

concerned 

A BILL 

To prohibit the replacement of the gasoline excise tax with 

a GPS, location or distance-based tax and for other purposes. 

1 Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa2 tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 

3 SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 

4 This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Don’t Track Me Act’’. 

5 SEC. 2. FINDINGS AND PURPOSE. 

6 (a) FINDINGS.—Congress finds as follows: 

7 (1) Tracking the location of vehicles and the 

8 identities of owners for the purpose of taxation, fines 


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1 or fees has the potential to be misused, and such 

2 collected data could be hacked or used for privacy3 invading purposes. 

4 (2) Government and corporate websites are fre5 quently hacked, and driver-tracking databases may 

6 be no more invulnerable to hacking; to the advan7 tage of criminals, stalkers, and identity thieves. 

8 (3) GPS tracking enables the technology for 

9 automatic speeding, parking and other traffic tick10 ets, charging variable tax rates due to the time of 

11 day or other factors, including characterizing driving 

12 behavior from acceleration and braking speed, eva13 sive maneuvers such as swerving to avoid a child or 

14 deer in the road, or driving in what the Government 

15 may believe is a ‘‘fuel-wasting’’ manner. 

16 (4) GPS tracking schemes may require vehicle 

17 owners to maintain bank accounts for the debiting 

18 of resultant fees. This may be a hardship for many 

19 low-income vehicle owners, as well as opening new 

20 hacking vulnerabilities for bank accounts of vehicle 

21 owners. 

22 (5) The existing gas tax is a rare example of a 

23 user fee, whereby vehicle owners pay for the roads 

24 they use when purchasing fuel. The tax has success25 fully provided necessary funding for many decades. 


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1 (6) There are far less intrusive ways than loca2 tion-based tracking to get electric vehicle and hybrid 

3 owners to pay for their road usage. 

4 (7) Vehicle owners must not be required to sur5 render their Fourth Amendment rights and be 

6 tracked everywhere as a condition of driving on pub7 lic roads. 

8 (8) Amendment IV of the United States Con9 stitution states ‘‘The right of the people to be secure 

10 in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against 

11 unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be vio12 lated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon prob13 able cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and 

14 particularly describing the place to be searched, and 

15 the persons or things to be seized.’’. 

16 (b) PURPOSE.—It is the purpose of this Act to pro17 hibit the replacement or supplementation of the Federal 

18 gasoline excise tax with any tax or fee based upon vehicle 

19 location or distance traveled, whether determined by global 

20 positioning satellite (GPS), license plate reading cameras 

21 or any other method of determining owner registration or 

22 identity information, and vehicle location or distance trav23 eled. 


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1 SEC. 3. PROHIBITION OF A GPS, LOCATION OR MILEAGE 

2 BASED TAX. 

3 (a) IN GENERAL.—It is contrary to the public policy 

4 of the United States to require the placement or use of 

5 any GPS, location, distance tracking system, or any other 

6 system to collect identities of vehicle owners by any remote 

7 means such as license plate reading cameras, radio fre8 quency identification (RFID) devices or by any other 

9 means. 

10 (b) The Federal gasoline excise tax may not be re11 placed or supplemented with any tax, fee or fine based 

12 upon vehicle location or distance traveled, whether deter13 mined by global positioning satellite (GPS), cameras that 

14 read license plates or any other method of determining ve15 hicle location, distance traveled or registration and iden16 tity data. 

17 (c) No motor vehicle may be required to have any 

18 device on board the vehicle or to transmit data to any off 

19 board device which tracks or records, collects, stores, 

20 transmits and location, distance, or registration or driver 

21 identity information. 

22 SEC. 4. LIMITATIONS ON VEHICLE-TO-VEHICLE AND VEHI23 CLE-TO-INFRASTRUCTURE COMMUNICA24 TIONS. 

25 (a) No public funds may be used to study or imple26 ment or require the use of any method of tracking or reVerDate Sep 11 2014 04:15 Dec 23, 2014 Jkt 049200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\H5884.IH H5884

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1 porting vehicle movement or location for the purpose of 

2 taxes, user fees, traffic fines, accident investigation, or to 

3 communicate with other vehicles or infrastructure. 

4 (b) Vehicle-to-vehicle or vehicle-to-infrastructure 

5 communication systems for the purposes of recording or 

6 transmitting or storing for later retrieval location, reg7 istration, identity, or speed data are prohibited, except for 

8 those vehicles owned or leased by Federal Government 

9 agencies in question. 

10 (c) Any such transmissions may only be used for mo11 mentary accident avoidance or completely anonymized 

12 traffic reporting. 

13 SEC. 5. ‘‘BLACK BOX’’ DATA RECORDERS. 

14 No motor vehicle shall be required by any Federal 

15 agency to have installed and operational any ‘‘black box’’ 

16 accident data recorder that records any vehicle data for 

17 a period longer than the last five minutes of vehicle oper18 ation, and such devices may never be capable of recording 

19 audio, images, or video from inside the vehicle. Any such 

20 device may not broadcast or transmit any data in any way, 

21 except by a direct cable connection to a computer. 

22 SEC. 6. VEHICLE OWNERS EXEMPTED. 

23 No provisions of this Act shall prohibit the use by 

24 vehicle owners of GPS or other technologies for tracking 

25 the location of their own vehicle. 


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1 SEC. 7. REPORTING REQUIREMENT. 

2 The Secretary of the Department of Transportation 

3 shall submit to Congress, not later than 90 days after the 

4 date of the enactment of this Act, a report describing the 

5 actions taken to ensure permanent compliance with this 

6 Act. 

Æ 


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