I 116th CONGRESS 1st Session H. R. 737 IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES January 23, 2019 Mr. Sablan (for himself, Mr. McCaul , Mr. Bishop of Georgia , Ms. Bonamici , Mr. Blumenauer , Mr. Brendan F. Boyle of Pennsylvania , Mr. Buchanan , Mr. Calvert , Mr. Cartwright , Mr. Chabot , Mr. Crist , Ms. DeGette , Mr. Fitzpatrick , Mr. Gallego , Mr. Garamendi , Ms. Hill of California , Mr. Huffman , Mr. Johnson of Georgia , Ms. Kaptur , Mr. Katko , Mr. Keating , Mr. Kennedy , Mr. Kinzinger , Ms. Kuster of New Hampshire , Mr. Lipinski , Mr. Lowenthal , Mr. McNerney , Mr. Mitchell , Ms. Norton , Mr. Panetta , Mr. Perlmutter , Mr. Quigley , Mrs. Radewagen , Mr. Raskin , Mr. Reschenthaler , Ms. Roybal-Allard , Mr. Ryan , Mr. Schweikert , Mr. Smith of Washington , Mr. Soto , Mr. Suozzi , Ms. Titus , Mr. Thompson of California , Mrs. Torres of California , Mr. Vela , Mrs. Watson Coleman , Ms. Wilson of Florida , Mr. Aguilar , Mr. Rodney Davis of Illinois , Mr. Gomez , and Mr. Weber of Texas ) introduced the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Natural Resources A BILL To prohibit the sale of shark fins, and for other purposes.

1. Short title This Act may be cited as the Shark Fin Sales Elimination Act of 2019 . 2. Prohibition on sale of shark fins (a) Prohibition Except as provided in sections 3 and 4, no person shall possess, offer for sale, sell, or purchase any shark fin or product containing any shark fin. (b) Penalty For purposes of section 308(a) of the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act ( 16 U.S.C. 1858(a) ), a violation of this section shall be treated as an act prohibited by section 307 of that Act. 3. Exemption for traditional fisheries, education, and science Section 2 shall not apply with respect to possession of a shark fin that was taken lawfully under a State, territorial, or Federal license or permit to take or land sharks, if the shark fin is separated from the shark in a manner consistent with the license or permit and is— (1) destroyed or discarded upon separation; (2) used for noncommercial subsistence purposes in accordance with State or territorial law; (3) used solely for display or research purposes by a museum, college, or university, or by any other person under a State or Federal permit to conduct noncommercial scientific research; or (4) retained by the license or permit holder for a noncommercial purpose. 4. Exemption for Dogfish (a) In general It shall not be a violation of section 2 for any person to possess, offer for sale, sell, or purchase any fresh or frozen raw fin or tail from any stock of the species Mustelus canis (smooth dogfish) or Squalus acanthias (spiny dogfish). (b) Report By not later than January 1, 2027, the Secretary of Commerce shall review the exemption in subsection (a) and shall prepare and submit to the Congress a report that includes a recommendation on whether the exemption should continue or be terminated. In preparing such report and making such recommendation, the Secretary shall analyze factors including— (1) the economic viability of dogfish fisheries with and without the continuation of the exemption; (2) the impact to ocean ecosystems of continuing or terminating the exemption; (3) the impact on enforcement of the ban contained in section 3 caused by the exemption; and (4) the impact of the exemption on shark conservation. 5. Definitions In this Act: (1) Shark The term shark means any species of the orders Pristiophoriformes, Squa­tin­i­formes, Squaliformes, Hexanchiformes, Lam­ni­formes, Carchariniformes, Orectolobiformes, and Heterodontiformes. (2) Shark fin The term shark fin means the raw, dried, or otherwise processed detached fin, or the raw, dried, or otherwise processed detached tail, of a shark. 6. State authority Nothing in this Act affects any right of a State or territory of the United States to adopt or enforce any regulation or standard that is more stringent than a regulation or standard in effect under this Act.