Interstate Transport Act Overrides State Knife Laws, Mandates Locked Containers for Travelers

The Interstate Transport Act of 2025 is looking to simplify life for anyone who travels across state lines with a knife, but it comes with a strict new set of rules and a significant power shift. Essentially, this legislation creates a federal standard for transporting knives, overriding any state or local laws that conflict with it, provided the person is otherwise legally allowed to possess the knife under federal law.

The Federal Road Rules for Blade Carriers

Think of this as a federal license for your knife during transit. The core of the bill (SEC. 2) says you can transport a knife between two places where possession is legal, but you must follow specific federal requirements on how you carry it. If you’re driving a car, the knife must be completely inaccessible from the passenger compartment. If your vehicle doesn't have a separate trunk—like an SUV or hatchback—the knife must be in a locked container that is not your glove box or center console. If you’re traveling by train, bus, or boat, it must be in a locked container. The bill is clear: this rule applies to your entire journey, including stops for food, fuel, or overnight stays in temporary lodging.

Why This Matters to Your Local Laws

This is where the federal preemption comes in. Many cities and states have complex, often confusing, laws about knife length, type (like switchblades or gravity knives), and accessibility. This bill wipes those local rules off the map for anyone engaged in interstate travel, as long as they comply with the federal storage requirements. For a construction worker driving a truck from Texas to New York, this means they no longer have to worry about violating a dozen different municipal ordinances along the way, provided their tools are locked down according to the federal standard. However, it also means that if your home state had a more relaxed law allowing you to keep a knife accessible in your car, you now have to follow the stricter federal locked-container rule whenever you cross a state line.

The Emergency Exception and the Legal Backstop

The bill carves out one important exception: emergency safety tools (SEC. 2). If you have a knife specifically designed to cut seatbelts or break glass in an emergency—one with a blunt or guarded tip—you can keep that accessible in the passenger compartment. This is a practical nod to modern safety. Furthermore, the bill creates a powerful legal shield: if you are arrested under a local law while complying with these federal transport rules, and you successfully use this Act as a defense, the court must award you all your legal costs and attorney's fees. Even better, they must order the expungement of all official records related to that arrest and proceeding. This is a massive win for individuals who might otherwise be financially ruined fighting local charges simply for driving through a jurisdiction with restrictive knife laws.

Practical Challenges and the Fine Print

While the legal protections are strong, the implementation details could be tricky. The definition of “transport” is broad—covering delays and overnight stays—but the bill specifically excludes the rule from applying to knives carried in the cabin of a commercial passenger aircraft, leaving TSA rules in charge there. The bill also has a significant exclusion: the transport protection doesn’t apply if you intend to commit a violent felony (punishable by more than one year in prison) during your journey. This subjective standard of “intent” could be a point of friction if law enforcement stops a traveler. Ultimately, this Act standardizes transport across the country, making travel simpler for those who carry tools or knives, but it does so by imposing a new, federally mandated set of storage restrictions that everyone must now follow.