Sponsors (17)
The bill strengthens criminal tools to deter and punish the use or threatened use of real or fabricated child sexual depictions — improving protections for victims — but raises risks of overcriminalization, higher incarceration and enforcement costs, privacy and free‑speech concerns, and uneven impacts on marginalized defendants.
Children and other victims of threatened distribution gain a new federal crime: threatening to distribute child sexual abuse material is prosecutable even if no real image exists, expanding legal protection for targets of coercion.
People (and families) threatened with sexual images — including fabricated or non-existent ones — benefit from stronger deterrence and prosecutorial tools because extortion/intimidation using such depictions can be charged and carries substantially higher penalties.
Federal prosecutors and courts gain clearer authority to impose aggravated penalties (up to 10 additional years) when sexual depictions are used to intimidate, coerce, extort, or cause severe emotional harm, which can increase consistency in sentencing for these aggravated offenses.
People accused of threatening distribution may face criminal charges even when no image exists, increasing the risk of wrongful prosecution based on allegations alone.
Longer maximum sentences for aggravated uses will likely raise prison populations and incarceration-related costs, increasing taxpayer burden for incarceration and supervision.
Expanded criminal penalties and higher mandatory maximums may reduce prosecutors' flexibility to plea-bargain, increase litigation and court burdens, and could prolong cases and costs for defendants and the justice system.
Based on analysis of 4 sections of legislative text.
Makes threatening to distribute sexual images of minors a federal crime even when no real image exists, and adds a 10-year sentence enhancement when depictions are used to intimidate or extort.
Introduced December 9, 2025 by Charles Ernest Grassley · Last progress December 9, 2025
Makes it a federal crime to threaten to distribute sexual images of minors even when no actual image or child pornography exists, by amending federal child-pornography statutes to treat such threats as the same offense as distribution. It also increases prison sentences by 10 years when someone knowingly uses a visual depiction or child pornography of a minor with the intent to intimidate, coerce, extort, or cause substantial emotional distress, and creates separate, heightened treatment of certain offenses by registered sex offenders. A severability clause preserves the rest of the law if any part is found unconstitutional.