Sponsors (5)
The bill strengthens federal tools and penalties to protect border operations and infrastructure, but does so by broadening criminal exposure—raising civil‑liberties risks, increasing potential sentences and taxpayer costs, and adding legal complexity.
Law enforcement and border communities gain stronger criminal tools—including felony penalties for sharing operational locations and the ability to prosecute attempts/conspiracies like completed offenses—making it easier to deter, intervene in, and punish plots that would undermine border security.
Border infrastructure and federal detection capabilities are better protected because destroying or tampering with federal border-control devices is made a felony, reducing attacks on surveillance and interdiction equipment.
Journalists, aid workers, bystanders, and people (including immigrants) who record or share footage near border operations could face felony charges if prosecutors allege illicit intent, risking criminalization of reporting, humanitarian assistance, and ordinary observation.
Broader criminal definitions and cross-reference changes expand firearm-related penalties (including much longer sentences when a firearm is involved), likely increasing incarceration lengths for some defendants and raising costs for taxpayers.
Changes to statutes of limitations and new cross-references broaden prosecutorial reach and add legal complexity, creating uncertainty for defendants, federal employees, and courts about exposure and applicable charges.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Creates federal crimes for transmitting law‑enforcement location info to further certain federal offenses and for damaging or evading federal border‑control devices, with fines and prison up to 10–20 years.
Introduced January 9, 2025 by Juan Ciscomani · Last progress January 9, 2025
Creates new federal crimes and penalties focused on protecting law‑enforcement operations and federal border‑control technology. It makes it a crime to knowingly transmit the location, movement, or activities of federal, state, local, or tribal law enforcement when done with the intent to further certain federal offenses (including immigration, customs, drug, and monetary‑instrument offenses), and to knowingly damage, alter, destroy, construct, or evade federal physical or electronic border‑control devices without lawful authorization. Penalties include fines and imprisonment up to 10 years, with up to 20 years when a firearm is used in furtherance; attempts and conspiracies are punished the same as completed offenses. Also revises several federal criminal statutes and definitions (including parts of 18 U.S.C. §924(c) and the statute of limitations provision at 18 U.S.C. §3298), and inserts the new offense into the Immigration and Nationality Act table of contents. The changes expand prosecutable conduct related to transnational criminal activity and border security and adjust cross‑references and statutory definitions used across criminal law provisions.