Review – HR 3334 Introduced – Capitol Police cUAS Authority

Back in May Rep Crane (R,AZ) introduced HR 3334, the USCP Empowerment Act of 2025. The bill would extend to the US Capitol Police (USCP) authority to take actions against unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) to mitigate a credible threat that an unmanned aircraft system poses to the safety or security of a covered Capitol Police facility or asset. No new funding is authorized. The authorization language is similar to that used in 6 USC 124n to provide limited counter UAS (cUAS) authority to DHS and DOJ.

Moving Forward

Neither Crane, nor his two cosponsors, are members of the House Administration Committee to which this bill was assigned for primary consideration. This means that there is not likely to be sufficient influence to see the bill considered in that Committee. I suspect that there would be some level of bipartisan support for this legislation in that Committee, but whether it would be sufficient to recommend the bill to the Full House is unclear.

One of Crane’s cosponsors {Rep Perry (R,PA)} is a member of the House Transportation and Infrastructure, to which this bill was assigned for secondary consideration. While this could provide a chance for consideration in that Committee, there will be some significant resistance to expanding cUAS authority without additional controls to protect the National Airspace. Similarly, there would be resistance in the House Judiciary Committee (also assigned secondary consideration) to allowing unqualified exceptions to the 18 USC provisions found in §2(a). Without approval of these two Committees the bill would be unlikely to move to the floor of the House for consideration.

Commentary

The need for well thought out cUAS authorities is clearly needed, but this piecemeal approach is not really the way to deal with this complex problem. Unfortunately, for the reasons discussed in the ‘Moving Forward’ section above this is going to be a difficult problem. It is going to take a combined effort by all three Committees (probably along with the Armed Services and Homeland Security committees) to be able to craft a sufficiently comprehensive bill. Unfortunately, that is unlikely to happen until there is a significant drone incident or some unauthorized cUAS activity unintentionally damages an unrelated aircraft.

 

For more information on the provisions of the bill, see my article at CFSN Detailed Analysis - https://patrickcoyle.substack.com/p/hr-3334-introduced-capitol-police - subscription required.