IIB 
116TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION 
H. R. 583 
IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 
FEBRUARY 26, 2019 
Received; read twice and referred to the Committee on Commerce, Science, 
and Transportation 
AN ACT 
To amend the Communications Act of 1934 to provide for 
enhanced penalties for pirate radio, and for other purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
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SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Preventing Illegal 
Radio Abuse Through Enforcement Act’’ or the ‘‘PIRATE 
Act’’. 
SEC. 2. PIRATE RADIO ENFORCEMENT ENHANCEMENTS. 
Title V of the Communications Act of 1934 (47 
U.S.C. 501 et seq.) is amended by adding at the end the 
following new section: 
‘‘SEC. 511. ENHANCED PENALTIES FOR PIRATE RADIO 
BROADCASTING; ENFORCEMENT SWEEPS; RE-
PORTING. 
‘‘(a) INCREASED GENERAL PENALTY.—Any person 
who willfully and knowingly does or causes or suffers to 
be done any pirate radio broadcasting shall be subject to 
a fine of not more than $2,000,000. 
‘‘(b) VIOLATION OF THIS ACT, RULES, OR REGULA-
TIONS.—Any person who willfully and knowingly violates 
this Act or any rule, regulation, restriction, or condition 
made or imposed by the Commission under authority of 
this Act, or any rule, regulation, restriction, or condition 
made or imposed by any international radio or wire com-
munications treaty or convention, or regulations annexed 
thereto, to which the United States is party, relating to 
pirate radio broadcasting shall, in addition to any other 
penalties provided by law, be subject to a fine of not more 
than $100,000 for each day during which such offense oc-
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curs, in accordance with the limit described in subsection 
(a). 
‘‘(c) ANNUAL REPORT.—Not later than 1 year after 
the date of enactment of the PIRATE Act, and annually 
thereafter, the Commission shall submit to the Committee 
on Energy and Commerce of the House of Representatives 
and the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transpor-
tation of the Senate a report summarizing the implemen-
tation of this section and associated enforcement activities 
for the previous fiscal year, which may include the efforts 
by the Commission to enlist the cooperation of Federal, 
State, and local law enforcement personnel (including 
United States attorneys and the United States Marshals 
Service) for service of process, collection of fines or forfeit-
ures, seizures of equipment, and enforcement of orders. 
‘‘(d) ENFORCEMENT SWEEPS.— 
‘‘(1) ANNUAL
SWEEPS.—Not less than once 
each year, the Commission shall assign appropriate 
enforcement personnel to focus specific and sus-
tained attention on the elimination of pirate radio 
broadcasting within the top 5 radio markets identi-
fied as prevalent for such broadcasts. Such effort 
shall include identifying, locating, and taking en-
forcement actions designed to terminate such oper-
ations. 
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‘‘(2) 
ADDITIONAL
MONITORING.—Within 
months after conducting the enforcement sweeps re-
quired by paragraph (1), the Commission shall con-
duct monitoring sweeps to ascertain whether the pi-
rate radio broadcasting identified by enforcement 
sweeps is continuing to broadcast and whether addi-
tional pirate radio broadcasting is occurring. 
‘‘(3) NO
EFFECT
ON
REMAINING
ENFORCE-
MENT.—Notwithstanding paragraph (1), the Com-
mission shall not decrease or diminish the regular 
enforcement efforts targeted to pirate radio broad-
cast stations for other times of the year. 
‘‘(e) STATE
AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT AUTHOR-
ITY.—The Commission may not preempt any State or 
local law prohibiting pirate radio broadcasting. 
‘‘(f) REVISION OF COMMISSION RULES REQUIRED.— 
The Commission shall revise its rules to require that, ab-
sent good cause, in any case alleging a violation of sub-
section (a) or (b), the Commission shall proceed directly 
to issue a notice of apparent liability without first issuing 
a notice of unlicensed operation. 
‘‘(g) PIRATE RADIO BROADCASTING DATABASE.— 
‘‘(1) IN
GENERAL.—Not later than 90 days 
after the date of the enactment of this section, and 
semi-annually thereafter, the Commission shall pub-
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lish a database in a clear and legible format of all 
licensed radio stations operating in the AM and FM 
bands. The database shall be easily accessible from 
the Commission home page through a direct link. 
The database shall include the following information: 
‘‘(A) Each licensed station, listed by the 
assigned frequency, channel number, or Com-
mission call letters. 
‘‘(B) All entities that have received a no-
tice of unlicensed operation, notice of apparent 
liability, or forfeiture order issued by the Com-
mission. 
‘‘(2) CLEAR
IDENTIFICATION.—The Commis-
sion shall clearly identify in the database— 
‘‘(A) each licensed station as a station li-
censed by the Commission; and 
‘‘(B) each entity described in paragraph 
(1)(B) as operating without a Commission li-
cense or authorization. 
‘‘(h) DEFINITION
OF
PIRATE
RADIO
BROAD-
CASTING.—In this section, the term ‘pirate radio broad-
casting’ means the transmission of communications on 
spectrum frequencies between 535 and 1705 kilohertz, in-
clusive, or 87.7 and 108 megahertz, inclusive, without a 
license issued by the Commission, but does not include un-
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licensed operations in compliance with part 15 of title 47, 
Code of Federal Regulations.’’. 
Passed the House of Representatives February 25, 
2019. 
Attest: 
CHERYL L. JOHNSON, 
Clerk. 
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