Sponsors
The bill strengthens protesters' privacy and increases transparency about federal UAV use, at the cost of reduced access to long-endurance UAV capabilities for public-safety missions, higher operational costs/risks for agencies, and added reporting burdens with potential security trade-offs.
People who attend or organize protests and public demonstrations will be less likely to be surveilled by covered federal UAVs, and there will be clearer limits on how long information about identified U.S. persons is retained.
Congress and the public gain greater transparency and oversight because the President must provide annual, incident-level reports on covered UAV uses (including justification, sensors, locations, retention, and whether U.S. persons were identified).
The risk of military-style, long-endurance UAVs being used domestically is reduced, lowering the chance of escalation in federal surveillance capabilities at domestic events.
Local law enforcement and emergency responders may lose access to long-endurance UAV support during large incidents, reducing situational awareness and potentially harming public safety.
Defense and DHS agencies could face capability gaps or higher costs because they can no longer fund the domestic use of certain long-endurance UAVs for protest-related missions, forcing reliance on costlier or less-capable alternatives.
Requiring annual incident-level disclosures of sensors, models, locations, and identified U.S. persons risks exposing operational details and creating national security vulnerabilities if protections fail or reporting is overly broad.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Prohibits federal funds for operating specified military-style UAVs to surveil U.S. persons at protests or civil disobedience and requires annual reports to Congress.
Introduced July 25, 2025 by Jimmy Gomez · Last progress July 25, 2025
Prohibits federal agencies from using federal funds to operate certain covered unmanned aircraft vehicles (UAVs) in the United States to surveil U.S. persons who are participating in protests or acts of civil disobedience, effective in fiscal year 2026 and thereafter. Requires the President to deliver annual reports to specified congressional committees describing every incident of covered UAV use in the U.S., with detailed, incident-level information and the option to submit classified reports or classified annexes.