Stop Transnational Repression Act
Bill: H.R.9460 | Sponsor: Rep. Schiff, Adam B. (D-CA)
Policy area: Crime and Law Enforcement

Summary:
Stop Transnational Repression Act
This bill establishes a new criminal offense related to transnational repression (e.g., activities of foreign governments to harass, intimidate, or coerce individuals in the United States).

To criminalize transnational repression, and for other purposes.

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

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``Stop Transnational Repression Act''.

SEC. 2. FINDINGS.

    Congress finds the following:
            (1) Transnational repression is not currently codified or 
        defined in United States law.
            (2) The Federal Bureau of Investigation defines 
        transnational repression as foreign government transgression of 
        national borders through physical and digital means to 
        intimidate, silence, coerce, harass, or harm members of 
        diaspora and exile communities. Transnational repression is 
        often used to silence individuals who oppose or are critical of 
        a government, including journalists, human rights defenders, 
        religious or ethnic minority groups, and political opponents. 
        Methods of transnational repression are known to include 
        physical and digital stalking, harassment, computer hacking, 
        criminal threats, assaults, attempted kidnappings, coerced 
        repatriation, and detaining family members in the home country.
            (3) Transnational repression is not limited to physical 
        acts of intimidation and harassment. According to Citizen Lab, 
        ``digital transnational repression'' tools are used to 
        facilitate government reach beyond borders to gain access to 
        social media and email accounts, including through phishing 
        attacks, zero-click spyware hacks, social media page takedowns, 
        SIM card hacks, and fake invitations to conferences. For human 
        rights activists and dissidents, this has a serious impact on 
        their advocacy work and sense of security, even if they have 
        relocated to escape physical intimidation.
            (4) On February 23, 2022, the National Security Division of 
        the Department of Justice launched a ``Strategy for Countering 
        Nation-State Threats'' in order to take a comprehensive, 
        ``whole-of-government'' approach to addressing threats the 
        United States faces from hostile nations, including 
        transnational repression.
            (5) Throughout 2022, the Department of Justice has charged 
        a number of individuals with stalking, harassing, and spying, 
        who allegedly perpetrated transnational repression to silence 
        United States residents who were critics of the People's 
        Republic of China.
            (6) Transnational repression is a growing problem. As of 
        August 2022, Freedom House has documented 735 direct, physical 
        cases of transnational repression that took place between 2014 
        and 2021.
            (7) A total of 85 new incidents of transnational repression 
        were recorded around the globe in 2021. Four governments, 
        Algeria, Belarus, Comoros, and Nigeria, attacked exiles abroad 
        for the first time last year, bringing the total number of 
        states engaged in transnational repression to 36. The number of 
        host countries, or countries where acts of transnational 
        repression took place, rose from 79 to 84, including the United 
        States.

SEC. 3. SENSE OF CONGRESS.

    It is the sense of Congress that hostile nations and authoritarian 
regimes have increasingly and aggressively targeted individuals in the 
United States. Agents of these governments have acted outside 
diplomatic channels to threaten, intimidate, harass, surveil, stalk, 
silence, and even plot to physically harm or kidnap persons within U.S. 
borders. Although transnational repression often involves actions that 
are already prohibited by U.S. law, their foreign government backing 
render these activities more egregious than the underlying acts of 
intimidation or harassment alone. Therefore, it is necessary to 
formally define and criminalize transnational repression in Federal 
law, and more actively track and report on instances transnational 
repression in the United States.

SEC. 4. CRIMINALIZING TRANSNATIONAL REPRESSION.

    (a) Offense.--Chapter 45 of title 18, United States Code, is 
amended by adding at the end the following:
``Sec. 971. Transnational repression
    ``(a) In General.--Whoever knowingly commits an act of 
transnational repression shall be fined under this title and imprisoned 
not more than 10 years.
    ``(b) Attempt or Conspiracy.--Whoever attempts or conspires to 
commit an offense under this section shall be subject to the same 
penalties as those prescribed for the offense, the commission of which 
was the object of the attempt or conspiracy.
    ``(c) Extraterritorial Jurisdiction.--There is extraterritorial 
Federal jurisdiction over an offense under this section.
    ``(d) Definitions.--In this section:
            ``(1) Agent of a foreign power.--The term `agent of a 
        foreign power' means an individual who operates subject to the 
        direction or control of a foreign government or official.
            ``(2) Extrajudicial killing.--The term `extrajudicial 
        killing' means an act with the intention to or in the knowledge 
        that such act will end the life of another person, when that 
        act is not incident to lawful sanction, public necessity, self-
        defense or the defense of others, or the law of armed conflict.
            ``(3) Proxy.--The term `proxy' means an individual acting 
        on behalf of an agent of a foreign power.
            ``(4) Transnational repression.--The term `transnational 
        repression' means any activity by a foreign government, or an 
        agent of a foreign power or a proxy thereof, that meets each of 
        the following criteria:
                    ``(A) The activity involves--
                            ``(i) any effort intended to intimidate or 
                        coerce, including by force or fear, a person to 
                        take an action in the interest of a foreign 
                        government;
                            ``(ii) any effort intended to intimidate or 
                        coerce, including by force or fear, a person to 
                        take an action to forebear from exercising a 
                        right guaranteed to the person by the 
                        Constitution or laws of the United States;
                            ``(iii) enabling an effort specified in 
                        clause (i) or (ii); or
                            ``(iv) an extrajudicial killing.
                    ``(B) The activity is engaged in for the purpose of 
                stifling dissent against or otherwise advancing the 
                interests of a foreign government.
                    ``(C) The activity--
                            ``(i) occurs, in whole or in part, in the 
                        United States; or
                            ``(ii) is committed against--
                                    ``(I) a United States person;
                                    ``(II) a person in the United 
                                States; or
                                    ``(III) a person not specified in 
                                subclause (I) or (II) if the activity 
                                could reasonably be expected to result 
                                in the deprivation of any rights, 
                                privileges, or immunities of such 
                                person secured or protected by the 
                                Constitution or laws of the United 
                                States.
            ``(5) United states person.--The term `United States 
        person' has the meaning given such term in section 105A(c) of 
        the National Security Act of 1947.''.
    (b) Clerical Amendment.--The table of sections for chapter 45 of 
title 18, United States Code, is amended by adding at the end the 
following:

``971. Transnational repression.''.

SEC. 5. CENTRALIZATION OF OVERSIGHT OF TRANSNATIONAL REPRESSION 
              PROSECUTIONS AND INVESTIGATIONS.

    (a) National Security Division.--The Attorney General shall 
centralize oversight of transnational repression prosecutions in the 
National Security Division of the Department of Justice, or any 
successor organization.
    (b) Counterintelligence Division.--The Attorney General, acting 
through the Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, shall 
centralize oversight of transnational repression investigations in the 
Counterintelligence Division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, or 
any successor organization.
    (c) Coordination.--In carrying out oversight under this section--
            (1) the Assistant Attorney General for the National 
        Security Division of the Department of Justice may coordinate 
        with other divisions of the Department of Justice, as 
        appropriate; and
            (2) the head of the Counterintelligence Division of the 
        Federal Bureau of Investigation may coordinate with other 
        divisions of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, as 
        appropriate.

SEC. 6. REPORTING ON TRANSNATIONAL REPRESSION.

    (a) Reports.--Not later than 180 days after the date of enactment 
of this Act, and annually thereafter, the Assistant Attorney General 
for the National Security Division of the Department of Justice and the 
Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, in consultation with 
the Director of National Intelligence and the head of any other 
department or agency the Assistant Attorney General and Director of the 
Federal Bureau of Investigation determines appropriate, shall submit to 
the appropriate congressional committees a joint report on incidents of 
transnational repression against or otherwise impacting a United States 
person. Each report shall contain the following:
            (1) An overview of transnational repression in the United 
        States or against United States persons outside of the United 
        States, including the governments that perpetrate transnational 
        repression and the tactics that they use.
            (2) A description of any activities that the Assistant 
        Attorney General of the National Security Division of the 
        Department of Justice or the Director of the Federal Bureau of 
        Investigation determines to be substantially similar to 
        transnational repression that do not fall within the definition 
        of transnational repression.
            (3) A description of efforts during the previous calendar 
        year to disrupt transnational repression through investigation 
        and criminal prosecution.
            (4) A description of efforts during the previous calendar 
        year by any agency of the United States Government to disrupt 
        transnational repression through means other than investigation 
        and criminal prosecution, including through diplomatic means.
    (b) Form.--Each report submitted under subsection (a) shall be 
submitted in unclassified form, but may include a classified annex.

SEC. 7. DEFINITIONS.

    In this Act:
            (1) Appropriate congressional committees.--The term 
        ``appropriate congressional committees'' means--
                    (A) the Committee on the Judiciary, the Committee 
                on Foreign Affairs, and the Permanent Select Committee 
                on Intelligence of the House of Representatives; and
                    (B) the Committee on the Judiciary, the Committee 
                on Foreign Relations, and the Select Committee on 
                Intelligence of the Senate.
            (2) Transnational repression.--The term ``transnational 
        repression'' has the meaning given the term in section 971 of 
        title 18, United States Code, as added by section 4.
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