Sponsors (8)
Official title: To amend section 1951 of title 18, United States Code (commonly known as the Hobbs Act), and for other purposes.
Introduced August 26, 2025 by Scott Perry · Last progress August 26, 2025
The bill reduces the risk of federal criminalization for minor, nonviolent labor-dispute activity and shifts decision-making to state and local prosecutors, but it shifts enforcement costs to state/local governments, creates some legal uncertainty, and preserves federal authority for serious violent offenses.
Workers and union members: the bill narrows federal offense definitions and limits penalties so that minor, nonviolent labor-dispute activity is less likely to result in federal criminal charges or severe federal sentences.
State and local governments and law enforcement: the bill gives state and local prosecutors primary authority over minor, otherwise-peaceful labor-dispute incidents, enabling locally tailored responses and greater local accountability.
Prosecutors and defendants: clearer statutory definitions (commerce, extortion, robbery, labor dispute) reduce prosecutorial ambiguity and may curb overbroad federal charging and inconsistent enforcement.
State and local taxpayers and governments: shifting primary responsibility for minor labor-dispute prosecutions to state and local authorities increases enforcement and prosecution costs at the state/local level.
Federal and state officials, and courts: the bill’s definitional changes may create legal uncertainty and trigger new litigation as courts interpret the rewritten terms.
Unions and workers involved in violent or coordinated serious conduct: federal prosecutors still retain authority to pursue serious or coordinated violent offenses, so high‑severity actions remain subject to federal charges.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Narrows the Hobbs Act, limits penalties, defines key terms, and exempts certain minor peaceful labor-dispute conduct from federal prosecution.
Rewrites the federal Hobbs Act to narrow the federal crime of robbery/extortion tied to commerce, limit penalties, define key terms, and adopt the National Labor Relations Act definition of a labor dispute. It creates an explicit exemption so certain minor, peaceful, non-patterned conduct during labor disputes is not prosecuted federally and is left to state or local authorities, while preserving existing antitrust and labor statutes and clarifying that overlap with state law does not bar federal jurisdiction.