Sponsors (5)
Official title: Amend the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act to reauthorize the Rural and Municipal Utility Advanced Cybersecurity Grant and Technical Assistance Program, and for other purposes.
Introduced August 7, 2026 by David Harold McCormick · Last progress August 7, 2026
The bill directs federal funding and prioritized technical assistance to improve cybersecurity and resilience at rural, municipal, and critical electric utilities—reducing outage and national‑security risk—while costing taxpayers up to $250 million and reducing public transparency and oversight, with potential gaps for some smaller utilities.
Rural and municipal electric utilities (and the rural communities they serve) can receive grants, cooperative agreements, or prizes to upgrade cybersecurity and better protect electricity service continuity.
Owners/operators of bulk‑power–critical and defense‑critical electric infrastructure receive targeted funding and assistance to secure systems whose disruption would cause wide outages or national‑security risks.
The program prioritizes entities with limited cybersecurity resources, directing help toward small utilities that serve underserved or rural customers.
Taxpayers face up to $250 million in new appropriations over FY2027–FY2031 to fund the program.
Cybersecurity information voluntarily shared under the program is exempted from FOIA and similar State/Tribal/local disclosure laws, reducing public transparency and making independent oversight of program awards and performance more difficult.
Smaller investor‑owned utilities that fall below thresholds may still lack resources and could face competition from larger applicants for limited funds, leaving some communities less protected.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Establishes a federal grant and technical assistance program with $250M authorized (FY2027–FY2031) to strengthen cybersecurity at rural, municipal, and other eligible electric utilities.
Provides a federal grant and technical assistance program to help rural, municipal, and other eligible utilities strengthen cybersecurity protections for the electric grid and related systems. The Secretary must run the program, award grants, cooperative agreements, and prizes, prioritize smaller or resource-limited entities and owners/operators of critical/reliability-sensitive electric infrastructure, and protect voluntarily shared program information from public disclosure. Authorizes $250 million in appropriations for FY2027–FY2031 to carry out the program and defines key terms and award criteria to support prevention, detection, response, and recovery from cyber threats to electric infrastructure.