S 157 Introduced
Earlier this month, Sen Grassley (R,IA) introduced S 157, the Drone Act of 2023. The bill would revise 18 USC to expand the coverage of the criminal code for misuse of unmanned aircraft. No funding is provided in this bill.
The language is very similar to S 3542 introduced in the 117th Congress. There was no action on the bill in the last session, other than adding three additional cosponsors. Those three new cosponsors have signed on to this bill.
Amended Provisions
Section 3(1) of the bill would amend 18 USC 39B(a) by adding to the current wording making it a crime to operate an unmanned aircraft in manner that interferes with the operation of an aircraft to also make it a crime to interfere with the operation of a:
Vessel of the United States,
Motor vehicle that is used, operated, or employed in interstate or foreign commerce, or
Vehicle used or designed for flight or navigation in space.
Section 3(2) of the bill would amend 18 USC 40A, changing the title of that section from “Operation of unauthorized unmanned aircraft over wildfires” to “Interference by unauthorized unmanned aircraft with law enforcement, emergency response, and military activities”. It then revises subsection (a) to read:
(a) IN GENERAL.— Except as provided in subsection (b), an individual who operates an unmanned aircraft and knowingly or recklessly operates an unmanned aircraft and—
(1) knowingly or recklessly interferes with a wildfire suppression, or law enforcement or emergency response efforts related to a wildfire suppression, shall be fined under this title, or
(2) knowingly or recklessly interferes with a law enforcement, emergency response, or military operation or activity of a unit or agency of the United States Government or of a State, tribal, or local government (other than a wildfire suppression or law enforcement or emergency response efforts related to a wildfire suppression) shall be fined under this title, imprisoned for not more than 2 years, or both.
New Section
Section 3(3) would add a new §40B, “Misuse of unmanned aircraft”, to 18 USC. The new section starts off with definitions in subsection (a). That subsection defines 15 key terms (most by reference to other sections in 18 USC) used in the new section, including:
Weapon of mass destruction (by reference to 18 USC 2332a)
Subsection (b) then adds the following offenses:
Subsection (d) establishes the maximum punishments for each of the above offenses.
Changes from S 3542
Under the new §40B(b)(1) discussion about the weaponization of unmanned aircraft, this new version of the bill expands the discussion of ‘damage’ under (D)(ii), this new version adds a new subclause:
“(II) critical infrastructure (as defined in section 1016 of the USA PATRIOT Act (42 U.S.C. 5195c)).”
Moving Forward
Grassley is the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee to which this bill was assigned for consideration. This means that there should be sufficient influence to see this bill considered in Committee. Since the bill has four Democrats as cosponsors, the bill should receive some level of bipartisan support, but there should be some opposition from the UAV industry. I suspect that the bill would pass in Committee, but there could be significant changes made in the process.
This bill is not important enough to move to the floor of the Senate under regular order and there should be enough opposition to prevent it from being considered under the unanimous consent process. There is a chance that the bill could be included in some larger piece of legislation or offered as an amendment to another bill.
Commentary
The new Intrusion on Protected Spaces offense includes an interesting provision. It includes ‘rules, regulations, and orders’ of DHS as types of Federal Law that could be used to establish areas where UAVs could be prohibited. There is not currently any specific authority for DHS to establish such areas beyond the very constrained authorization in 6 USC 124n(k)(3)(C)(i) limited to federal facilities protected by DHS.
The similar authority granted to the FAA could be important, if/when the FAA ever gets around to writing its regulation allowing critical infrastructure facilities to petition to be covered by a UAS-specific flight restriction as required by §2209 of PL 114-190 (120 Stat 634). Those regulations were supposed to have been done by January 11th, 2017.