PROTECT Act Grants Tribal Courts Power to Issue Warrants for Digital Data and Expands Drug/Gun Jurisdiction

The Protection for Reservation Occupants against Trafficking and Evasive Communications Today Act of 2025, or the PROTECT Act, significantly boosts the legal authority of Federally Recognized Indian Tribes. This bill primarily integrates Tribal courts into the federal system for accessing digital data and expands the types of criminal offenses Tribal courts can prosecute on their lands. It’s a major move toward strengthening Tribal sovereignty and law enforcement capabilities.

The Digital Data Upgrade: Tribal Warrants Get Federal Teeth

Section 2 of the PROTECT Act makes a crucial change to the Stored Communications Act (SCA), which governs how law enforcement gets access to your stored emails, texts, and other digital records from service providers like Google or Verizon. Before this, only federal and state courts were explicitly considered "courts of competent jurisdiction" that could issue warrants for this data. Now, Tribal courts that have general criminal jurisdiction and are authorized to issue search warrants are explicitly included in the system.

What does this mean for everyday people and tech companies? For Tribal law enforcement, it means they can now go directly to a Tribal court to get a warrant for digital evidence in the same way a state police department would go to a state judge. For the service providers—the companies holding the data—it means they must now recognize and comply with warrants issued by Tribal courts, provided those warrants follow the specific procedures laid out in 25 U.S.C. 1302(a)(2). This streamlines investigations for Tribal police but adds a new layer of compliance complexity for the tech industry, which now has a much wider array of jurisdictions to track.

Expanding Criminal Jurisdiction on Tribal Lands

Section 3 tackles criminal jurisdiction, adding two major offense categories to the list of crimes Tribal courts can handle: controlled substance-related offenses and firearms offenses. This isn't just a technical update; it gives Tribal governments the ability to prosecute serious crimes that directly impact their communities.

For controlled substance offenses, the bill adopts the federal definition of controlled substances and includes everything from drug trafficking (manufacturing, distributing, etc.) to simple unlawful possession of drugs or drug paraphernalia. For a firearms offense, the bill allows Tribal courts to prosecute violations involving the use or possession of a firearm while committing a "covered crime," or if the person has a prior domestic violence conviction. This expansion allows Tribal authorities to more effectively address the specific challenges of drug and gun violence on their reservations, closing potential jurisdictional gaps that previously hampered local law enforcement efforts.

Post-Conviction: Access to Federal Programs

Finally, Section 4 ensures that the individuals convicted under this newly expanded Tribal criminal jurisdiction are not left out of the federal correctional system’s benefits. It updates the law to make sure that offenders convicted of crimes comparable to serious violent crimes can be included in the Bureau of Prisons Tribal Prisoner Program. This is important for rehabilitation and maintaining consistency in the correctional system, ensuring that those serving time under Tribal jurisdiction have access to the same resources and programs as those convicted under federal law.