Sponsor
Adam Schiff
Senator · D-CA
Senator · D-CA
The bill increases integrity by barring individuals with certain executive‑level convictions from federal executive roles, but it risks disrupting agency staffing, narrowing candidate pools, creating legal ambiguity and screening burdens, and potentially excluding people for unrelated past offenses.
Federal agencies and nominees: the bill bars individuals who, as CEOs, were convicted of fraud, bribery, embezzlement, insider trading, wage theft, cybercrime, copyright infringement, or tax evasion from holding executive-branch office.
General public: the bill strengthens integrity and public trust by keeping recently convicted executive‑level individuals out of federal executive positions.
Workers and employees: the bar on executives convicted of wage theft signals enforcement priority and may protect workers by discouraging or penalizing corporate wage‑theft perpetrators.
Federal agencies, current executives, and the public: the measure could remove some sitting executive-branch officials and narrow the candidate pool, causing abrupt staffing disruptions, delayed hiring, and reduced managerial flexibility across agencies.
Individuals with past convictions and aspiring appointees: people convicted of unrelated or non-job‑related offenses may be permanently barred from federal executive service even when offenses bear no relation to public duties.
Nominees, employers, and state governments: including 'comparable' state offenses creates legal ambiguity that expands background‑screening burdens, increases litigation risk and compliance costs, and could produce uneven enforcement across jurisdictions.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Bars appointment and requires removal of executive-branch officials who were finally convicted of specified crimes when part of the conduct occurred while they served as a CEO.
Official title: Prohibit chief executive officers convicted of crimes relating to corruption from serving in the executive branch, and for other purposes.
Introduced July 23, 2026 by Adam Schiff · Last progress July 23, 2026
Prohibits appointment or continued service in executive-branch positions for any person who has been finally convicted of certain criminal offenses when any part of the criminal conduct occurred while that person was serving as chief executive officer of a public or private non‑Federal entity. It defines a set of "covered crimes" (federal offenses and comparable state offenses) and requires removal of anyone already serving in an executive-branch position on enactment day who would be ineligible under this rule. The measure applies regardless of whether the criminal conduct related to the person's official duties as CEO and covers crimes such as bribery, cybercrime, embezzlement, fraud, insider trading, wage-theft, copyright infringement, and tax evasion. It focuses on final convictions and uses comparable state-law offenses to capture crimes prosecuted at the state level.